The War Pig Effect
by MJDM95
Summary: A platoon of War Pigs from Char in a desperate holdout gets transported to Omega when the xel-naga artefact activates, being War Pigs they go around offering services as mercs and due to their performance, has captured the attention of the Illusive man...
1. Before the Prologue even happens

**This the prologue chapter for Mass Pigs, there is no story in here but merely some stuff i want to put in here. One of the main things is that i will not tolerate flaming, i write my stories any way i like and will not be subjected to the bitching of a 12 year old fanboy. So be warned, no flames or you won't get top review ever again on my fic. Fanfic is a bitch to write, there is the constant grammatical error we all face when writing/typing. This fic was inspired by Commander Rosh's Starcraft/Mass Effect fanfic, it severely overpowers the Starcraft side and even calls it pri-fucking-mitive. This pissed me off alot, and I'm glad that fic hasn't been updated for the betterment of both him and us reviewers. Now, if i have done a mistake like nerfing the ME verse too much, please write to me or review it, but NO FLAMES, give it constructive, CONSTRUCTIVE not going "OMG ME PWNS EVERYTHING NOOO U SUCK SHIT" this kind of crap you give me is pretty much something that crawled out from the garbage and paste itself on the internet. Another thing, please use your arguments by reference to canon, meaning books, wikias or comics, they are the closest you have to a realistic source, not gameplay, where you have health and can tank bullets even once your Kinetic Barrier is down which is bs it's like shooting some guy and he can withstand bullets from half a rifle magazine**** before going down and just because the Marines from SC have 45 health does not mean it's useless, it's because simply it is a game, a CMC-400 is very powerful, the weakest man can actually kill another human just by his bare hands alone when in the suit. The suit features servos and hydraulics to augment the user's strength, meaning a Marine can run 2 kilometers and not feel fatigued, and second, the characters are mercs, their standard of discipline can be compared to a panda following the whims of a zookeeper, but their fire discipline is one to look out for, the suits can tank small arms, ME rounds fire shredded metal as small as a grain of sand at a really fast speed, it is the same as being hit by a .50 cal, but on the other hand, the C-14 uses a really big spike fired at hypersonic speed, that's almost like firing from a 20mm anti infantry, canon. The c-14s rip the barriers apart fast because the kinetic barrier is much much much weaker than standard protoss shields. Oh yes, the H-U-D is activated and used by blink-clicking, the suit's scanner gets your retina then use your eye to navigate the HUD then blink if the user wishes to open something like suit integrity, environmental status, oxygen supply, etc,etc. -continued after Dramatis Personae**

**Dramatis Personae.**

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><p><strong> : Franklin Toretto, MSGT I, War Pig, former Delta Squad,<strong>

** : Eddie Finnick, CPL, War Pig, Delta Squad**

** : Wilkins Frost, PFC, War Pig, former Delta Squad**

** : Travis Dollohorf, PVT, War Pig, Delta Squad**

** : Fick D. Montero, PFC, War Pigs, Delta Squad**

** : Muhammad Salleh Jackson, PFC, Delta Squad**

** : Russell Chang Kai Shek, PFC, Delta Squad**

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><p><strong> : Guerro Santos, SGT III, War Pigs, Charlie Squad<strong>

** : Mike Bloomfield, PVT, War Pigs, former Charlie Squad**

** : Neddy Sorenson, PFC, War Pigs, Charlie Squad**

** : Warren Birth, CPL, War Pigs, Charlie Squad **

** : Carter Woods, PFC, War Pigs, Charlie Squad**

** : Erickson Kaufmann, PVT, War Pigs, Charlie Squad**

** : Robert Farmiga, PVT, War Pigs, Charlie Squad**

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><p><strong> : Nebraska T. Fenwork, SGT II, War Pigs, Bravo Squad<strong>

** : Hagen Sparrow, CPL, War Pigs, Bravo Squad**

**: Reynald D. Catachan, CPL, War Pigs, Bravo squad**

**: Peter .D Polanski, PFC, War Pigs, former Bravo squad**

**:Imlay Jacintho, CPL, War Pigs, former Bravo Squad**

**:Moseby Doerrman, PVT, War Pigs, Bravo Squad**

**:Ford Tobias Sulaco, PVT, War Pigs, Bravo Squad**

**:Imran Zakariah, PFC, War Pigs, Bravo squad**

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><p><strong>: Savchenko Gallardi, SGT II, War Pigs. former Alpha Squad<strong>

**: Donnelly T. Curtkins, PFC, War Pigs, Alpha Squad**

**: Sheen Lai, PFC, War Pigs, Alpha Squad**

**: Barry Evans, PFC, War Pigs, Alpha Squad**

**: Hanz Adolf Weiss, CPL, Alpha squad**

**: Samuel L. Ackerson, CPL, former Alpha squad**

**: Dreddovich Ivanovich, PVT, Alpha Squad**

**: Billy T. Blanket, PVT, Alpha Squad**

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><p><strong>: Nijax G. Swash, LT II, Dominion Psi-Corps<strong>

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><p>:<strong> Browning Smirth, CPT, Dominion Royal Navy<strong>

**: Terris Boulevard, CPT, Dominion Royal Navy**

**: Francis A. McMillan, CPT, Dominion Royal Navy**

* * *

><p><strong>: Yggdrasil, Cerebrate, Fenris Swarm, Former Zerg Swarm<strong>

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><p><strong>.Pt 2, okay, now that's over with, I'll just explain a bit, the names with the word "FORMER" included with their affliations means they in a way are allies to Shepard, and yes, the Zerg will appear too, but it will be quite a while before they become Allies, in the meantime I am currently ranking up on my SC2 ladder, rewriting chapters 3-8 WHICHEVER ONES NEED MORE TOUCH UPS, shit, caps sorry, chapter 9 is being worked on too, so don't worry much yeah? KTHXBYE!<strong>


	2. Chapter 1: Prologue

**Char, 2502**

**Dominion Battle sector 4.3**

**Status of Battle:FUBAR**

**Original Defender strength:300 Dominion Marines, 55 War Pigs Mercenaries, 100 Raynor's Raiders**

**Current Defender strength:30 active War Pigs**

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><p>"...Negative, Commander, Queen Bitch's forces are getting a surround on us, We're too far out for evac..It's been an honour working for you, sir , if you make it outta here, tell mykids their daddy died for a good cause." scratched the voice over the Private Comm.<p>

There was silence for a short while, a mere facade as a great battle roared all across Char's Northern hemisphere. Raynor's voice soon was heard.

"Consider it done, Staff Sergeant."

Falks closed the PrivateCom before racking the slide of his C-14. The tunnel they were holed up in provided a huge advantage to the 30 strong mercs, they managed to funnel a large number of Zerglings and some banelings through, the bigger Zerg minions were forced to sit it out as their smaller brethren were slaughtered en' masse.

Things went well until a Contigent of Zerg Roaches, newer strains of heavy duty xenomorphs brought down a section of the cave with their claws and acid saliva, which apparently was the right flank of the battered War Pigs.

Now with a large enough hole, Hydralisks and the occasional Infestors are clawing and shoving their way in, creating a bigger hole than it was before.

Falks sprayed a couple of Banelings squeezing their way through a gaggle of Roaches, as the 8mm spikes hit home, they detonated with a in sync as thick and wet corrosive acid splashed on all sides, killing scores of nearby Zerglings unlucky ebough to be around and wounding one of the nearby Roaches.

However, this also caused the hole to enlarge even further as the acid ate away at the hardened gravelly wall. It was large enough for the Hydralisks to rear up in full height, and they now started pounding the Terrans with acidic Grooved Spines.

Private Moesby, caught a spine to the arm and fell with a grunt, his suit sealing off the wounded section and pumping painkillers and detox into his bloodstream to stop the poison from corrupting his body. Slowly, he reached for his fallen rifle and smote his attacker with precise shots to the eyes, thanks to the targeting systems of his suit.

A nearby Corporal yelled "Medic!" as he dragged a wounded PFC Hewitt who was bleeding out, a nasty gash on his CMC-400 suit. Wiring and flesh alike exposed. Falks, gathered his squad to shore up on an exposed flank to their left as more and more carapaced abominations crashed into cavern.

"If only we had some fire support..." muttered Falks as he found himself in need of another reload, He read his HUD on what armaments he had left, pretty good actually, 4 fully loaded mags for the C-14, x3 HE frags, x3 Flashbangs, x1 smoke grenade, his trusty custom made Flak pistol, and his bayonet affixed inside the rifle.

All good.

Falks felt a gnawing feeling in his gut that this may very well be his last combat operation, he himself withdrew from the battle, the blood, the carnage and the dying around him. The mercenary out a tattered picture of his happy family of 4, his wife, Cindy and his 3 strappign young 'uns, Marlowe, Morice and Micky, the 3 no older than 10. on the back of the picture, were the words _'Come home soon Daddy!'_ They were the reason he stayed on as a War Pigs mercenary.

"Sorry boys,"

He sniffed and crumpled the picture tightly and then pocketed the parchment back in his pouch, "But Daddy's not coming back, not this time."

The general communications in the War Pigs network was a real mess, nobody could identify who was who, and none of the reports feeding in were heartening.

"...Alpha 2-2 get some covering fire on those entrances, they're trying to establish a foothold on us..."

"Mike, frag that ugly piece of... "

"Medic!...

"Our Father Art In Heaven..."

"Oh God, it's got me, Help! Aaaugh!"

"Fire in the hole!..."

"Charlie 1-3 you're clear pull back now!"

"Second wave! Right behind those entrances!"Yelled Sergeant "Tea" Nabraski.

Immediately Falks snapped back to reality and brought his rifle to bear when he saw more Zerg strains waiting just outside, their shining orange carapace gleaming underneath the scorching sun of Char.

They waiting for their brethren inside to wear the War Pigs down before cleaning everything up.

"Falks! On your nine!" screamed his second in Command, Eddie Finnick, Corporal.

Falks was trying to swap mags after downing that pesky Roach and got the message a tad too late, he whirled just in time to see a baneling coming up hard, he could only shield himself but before that, he heard Eddie's voice over the Comm

"Frag fucking out!"

The round fist sized object came bouncing in between the Baneling and the War Pig, and he did what any man would do in that situation; shield himself with his hands.

And as luck would have it, the grenade detonated and sent him him flying across the dead end of the tunnel, the baneling detonated in a gory flash of green and yellow. Instead of shredding through his suit with shrapnel, he got his his ass vaulted several meters and crashed into a wall. His vision was blurred, his suit beeping and blaring all sorts of alarms and as he lay sprawled on the creep infested floor, Falks awaited death to take him.

It was not to be.

A shadowy silhouette came tumbling to him, it became clearer it was actually another combat suited Terran and the visor was open revealing someone too young to even be considered a battle hardened Merc, he tried to get Falks up and running, the orchestra of death and battle blaring all around the two.

"Sir, sir, ya' gonna be fine, sir, goddammit stay with me," his voice sounded slurred to Falks, and the shell-shocked mercenary instead took a turn for the worse, drifting in and out of consciousness, struggling to respond.

Calling for a medic was moot.

The War Pigs' medics were on the other side of the cavern, and the 2 were entrapped within a wall of Zerg strains trying to consume them,

"Covering fire, covering fire!"

Spat someone over the Comms. The merc felt his options running out, the Staff Sergeant was beginning to become dead weight and his hand reached for his adrenaline shot, with one hand, the other holding down the trigger of the C-14 as it spat death 30 times a second.

Falks felt his body being pumped with something foreign and in an instant felt his heartbeat throbbing wildly, his vision cleared up significantly, and pain, like he never felt before, causing him to breathe and suck in hard.

As he did so, he felt strength returning to him and sat up immediately, he shook his head, grabbed a rifle and gunned down an overconfident Zergling, before getting back on his feet.

The same Pig that saved him rapped his shoulder plate hard, "Sir, stay with me, hey, hey, c'mon boss, up and over!"

They sprinted over to the defensive positions the Pigs had hastily dug themselves in.

Hydralisk spines and leaping Zerglings hindered the 2 greatly, the merc that saved Franklin got clipped by a stray Roach, he went down screaming in pain and in fear.

Falks unloaded his entire clip into the offending Zerg's body, it's armored platings shrugging off the depleted uranium spikes, however, 2 more more War Pigs entered the fray, and adding firepower to the Staff Sergeant's barrage. Their own customized bullets doing more damage. The shrieking Roach had no choice but to burrow and retreat or face pulverisation.

Falks stomped over to where the Pig lay, and tried getting him back up on his feet, before he could do so, however, the cave became enlightened and engulfed in bright light, signaling the activation of the Xel-Naga artefact.

Falks drifted out of consciousness, the last thing he remembered before passing out was that every single Zerg present were screaming in pain, some Pigs doubling over and crying out, clamping their ears, unable to withstand the roaring racket.

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><p><strong>Char, 2502<strong>

**Dominion main HQ**

**Status:Besieged**

**Status of Artefact: T-10 seconds to full strength**

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><p>"..10 more seconds boys! Don't let up!" spat Raynor over the Comms as he and the survivors, numbering less than a hundred thousand bravely held the line through blood, sweat and firepower that has truly defined Terran military doctrine for over 300 years.<p>

The Zerg however, unending in numbers, had swept the the defences the Terrans could muster aside. Men and women perished, screaming as a tide of shiny muddy brown shells simply trampled them, not bothering to stop and have a bite or two.

Matt Horner sat on his bridge co-ordinating with the Dominion Admirals to stem the number of Zerg spaceborn fighters was the first to notice the artifact was fully charged by then, frantically pinged Raynor to activate the damn Xel-Naga Relic.

Back on the surface, Raynor, was frozen where he stood as he saw the woman he once loved- _the woman he loves_ tore through a contigent of Raiders with her claws and nasty appendages, licking their blood off her fingertips.

As if Kerrigan knew she was being watched, she snarled and whipped around to face Commander James Raynor,

"You can't save me, Jim, nothing can," Her voice was soft and sinewy and began strutting slowly towards him, flexing her claws as she does so. Small arms fire simply bounced off her thick plating as she continued to her desired path.

Raynor backed off, unable to bear to kill Sarah. He slowly looked around what was going on. Tychus, was atop a fallen Goliath Assault walker , his chaingun spitting hundreds of rounds defiantly back at the alien Swarm, a lone medic flailing helplessly as she was dragged off by Hydralisks, 3 Marines going hand-to-hand combat with some Zerglings. He briefly saw General Horace Warfield hit a Zergling in the face before being swarmed by about a hundred more, in fact he could hear EVERYTHING going on but strangely enough he could not hear Matt's voice screaming, pleading, begging him to start up the artefact. The artefact!

It may or may not bring his lover back, but it would get rid of the sector and humanity's scourge ONCE AND FOR ALL!

The Queen of Blades was drawing nearer and nearer, Jim had no time to engage her and left a pitiful squad of soldiers to stall her.

Pushing past a Private busy stabbing a Zergling with his bayonet, he clambered up to the high ground where the Xel-Naga device was set up.

The Queen of Blades finished off the last Marine detachment and noticed whatRaynor was attempting to do, her eyes widened in fear as Raynor palmed the activation button, as the infested Kerrigan reached out with one infested clawed hand, "NO!" before everything went blindingly white...

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><p><strong>AN: SORRY FOR THE DELAY GUYS, SCHOOL REALLY KEPT ME BUSY AND I WANNA REDO THIS STORY AGAIN. FOR ONE, I REALISED HAVING A RENEGADE FEMALE SHEPARD SEEMED THE BEST CHOICE FOR THIS FIC AND IT WAS MY ORIGINAL INTENT TO DO SO, AND HAVE THE WAR PIGS CONSTANTLY PISS HER OFF WITH DEFIANCE, I HATE THE BITCH SO I FIND IT GOOD TO HAVE SOMEONE CRAWL UNDER HER SKIN. :)<strong>


	3. Chapter 2: Where the hell are we?

**2185 CE, 1930 hours...**

**Omega...unknown exact location**

The War Pigs were pinned in the stinking filthy alley, gunfire and fast moving metals zipped and whizzed all around them.

Falks overturned the dumpster of sort, or at least he think it was, and used it as makeshift cover. Up until now he still didn't know what the fuck has happened, how or why. Gunfire was erupting all around him.

Blue Suns Mercenaries, of course he didn't know what they are, he only dubbed them blue bastards, were slowly pinning him down, unfortunately for them, the Staff Sergeant managed to draw enough fire from hostiles for the other War Pigs to flank them on both sides.

Civilians were fleeing away from the firefight, thankfully enough so he wouldn't need to worry about shooting innocent...aliens? now his only worry was collateral damage.

* * *

><p><strong>Approx 15 minutes ago...<strong>

**2185 CE, 1915 HOURS...**

**Omega, Terminus Systems**

* * *

><p>The inhabitants of Omega's lower districts did about their daily business just as any other day, gunfights were rather common there too, and that was the only unnatural occurence the inhabitants were prepared for.<p>

But they weren't exactly prepared for what was to come next. A flash of white, engulfing everything within sight, some screamed in fear, others tried getting to safety. As quickly as it had appeared, it vanished just as fast, in it's place were bipedal humanoids, clad in bulky metallic armor and sprawled all around the place, within moments a large crowd formed around them, eager to find out what was going on.

The strange robotic armors gave hissing sounds, and motors began whirring as the users began coming round, causing some of the local population to back away in fear.

A lone human woman, curiosity having fully overwhelmed her natural instincts to flee, came closer. And oh so closer to the iron men,_ where had they come from? Were they connected to that blinding flash of light?_ She now stood at least 3 feet away from them but it felt she was only 3 centimeters apart from them. She began having second thoughts now, the crowd's eyes fell on her, as if egging her on to make first contact, _I should have stayed home. _

Her heart began pounding when the armored forms were back on their feet. Then one of them strode towards her in full height, the suit was huge, at least 7 feet tall.

She began having wild speculations of what could be behind that large bulky suit but none of her guesses were that close, imagine her surprise when the suit having what appeared to be a visor, slipped open, revealing, a human no older than 30.

"Erm, uh..hi?"

The woman gave no response for she had collapsed onto the ground, fully unconscious.

"Was it something I said?"

Said the power armored human once more.

* * *

><p>Flash of white...blinding...painful..and when the blindness finally left, they were standing on some sort of road, the battered war-torn men quickly realized they were in a city, with techno beats wailing out across nightclubs.<p>

And to make things worse, the entire town/city or whatever this place is, was populated by both humans and unknown xenos alike. At one point they were fighting for their lives tearing up hordes of Zerg on Char, next thing they knew, they were standing in the middle of some alien city.

A pedestrian crossing to be precise earning stares from alien passers-by.

"Hey, the fuck you looking at bitches?"

One of the Pigs took aim with his monster of a weapon in the general direction of passers-by. Screams tore through the ranks of the civvies as they wailed and ran in several directions trying to get away from the insane power armored man.

"Samuels, hey, hey, cool it goddammit, you're scaring the population!"

Sergeant 'Tea' smacked the rifle aside with his armored hand thus throwing off the Pig's aim.

"Sorry, sir, just...just a little jet lagged and all. Aww shit man, this ain't happening, this ain't fucking happening!" the Pig threw a fit, unable to accept the fact he's stranded light years from the Koprulu-Sector, a Sector he and trillions of souls called home.

And as much as the War Pigs wanted to dismiss the whole ordeal as a bad dream cooked up by the Xel-Naga Artifact, everything that was happening was so surreal and if it was a dream, why the hell were they all interconnected in the same dream?

The Pigs had to plan their next course of action, first things first. Some asshole with an itchy trigger finger suggested shooting the shit out of every xeno they found but he was immediately shut down by the other members for they were professional badass private military contractors, not mass murderers.

Staff Sergeant Falks slowly shook his head, still disoriented when the artifact was activated and it's purpose was unleashed and engulfed the entire planet.

He HUD detected a human female coming closer and closer towards him. She was dressed in civilian clothing unlike any other design he's seen, not even those yokels from the Fringe Worlds wear those kind of clothing, this further proves the War Pig IC they're a long way from home.

A very long way.

Now, the woman lay roughly 3 feet away, her face was one piqued with both curiousity and interest, though it was more likely fear and awe, either she's brave enough or foolish enough to go near one of the most feared mercenary gangs in the Koprulu Sector, unarmed.

Falks needed answers and this lady could be well possibly tell him, with a little help of intimidation thrown in should she become uncooperative. Falks turned the gun to her, earning several gasps from the crowd, the other 29 men shut their visors, targeting systems online, scanning the crowd for concealed weapons and other nasties should the situation turn into one massive shootout.

"Erm,.uh..hi?"

The human woman hit the floor unconscious, probably scared out of her wits. Not everyday, giant armored humans get teleported right in front of your eyes.

"Was it something I said?"

He spoke aloud via external speakers towards the crowd.

Falks, tried a different approach this time, no need for people dropping dead on his feet, but that didn't mean he couldn't use threats, so he snapped his visor shut and faced a scrawny looking humanoid with big bulging eyes and a big bulging head. He pointed his Impaler towards a random Salarian.

"You, Snail-head, with...with the big eyes, talk! Where are we?"

The Salarian began hysterically babbling in his language, of which not one War Pig understood a single word, he pointed on one of the signs, strangely enough written in English.

Though grime, mud and scum had eroded the words, it wasn't that hard to piece together what it was shown, 'Omega, Lower District'

Omega?

They never heard of a place named Omega in the Koprulu Sector, or even unknown alien species who seem friendly enough to work with Humans, unless,

"No, that's impossible,"

Mumbled Falks, or is it?

He turned to face his men, the wounded, and all, and told them to gather round the dumpster, the crowd were dispersing now, but at a slow pace, a few even tried to take a picture with their funny glowing wrist-PDA and had to be chased away, non-lethal style.

The other members of the War Pigs had not taken the bad news well. Omega? ain't heard of that kind of place in the Koprulu Sector, much less intelligent alien species other than Protoss and Zerg.

There was one obvious answer of course; They were no longer even in the Koprulu Sector and that got them in mixed reactions. Anguish, frustration, curiousity, and some were downright hysteric about not seeing home ever again.

Some of the Pigs managed to bring the Pigs back to their senses and told them to suck it up and adapt.

Thankfully enough, everyone who was fighting in the cavern on Char was present and accounted for, even the wounded ones of which the others took it upon themselves to get them back on their feet.

"Okay, okay, so we've gone from Char to planet shithole after Raynor activated that artifact thing, we got no way of getting home, ammo's gettin' low and Mikey here keeps snagging my motherfucking cigs! Anything I left out?" groaned Private Fick.

A Corporal inquired to the group before lighting a cigar. There was a raised hand at the back, "Yeah, you guys missed this-or him."

Everyone turned heads and standing beside the mercenary was a Dominion Ghost Operative, in his H.E.S, helmet on and his C-10 Canister Rifle slung on his right hand.

"A Ghost? Shit, I didn't see him back in the caverns with us!"

"Ya' got me..."

Things began to turn sour then. Some of the War Pigs believed the Ghost was the one responsible for sending them all to - wherever the hell 'here' is.

"This little fuck must've been behind all this shit, Ghosts don't pop up without wierd shit happenin'!"

"Damn straight, I say we frag the fuck!"

"Give 'im to me lads, old Farmiga here wants to play a game with him!"

A massive figure stepped up to the front before addressing the 30 strong merc group. Falks.

"Cut this shit out! It don't matter if he's the one who sent us here, fragging him won't send us back! Alright, first things first we gotta work out leadership, who's in charge shit, from there we can next course of action. We ain't in the Koprulu Sector anymore. Suck it up guys. Now, I'm a Staff Sergeant, First Class. Anyone higher than me?"

Nobody raised a hand.

"Good, now we-"

The same trooper with the Ghost beside him raised his hand.

"Sir, the Ghost's an El-Tee."

Someone silenced him quickly enough.

"That Ghost won't talk much Ned, he ain't no use commanding us in a fight."

Before Falks could continue, several shots, similar to gunfire being discharged were heard, several blocks down the street. Civillians began panicking and some that had brought loved ones got them behind cover, a few were even crying. Falks wanted to take a team to investigate but was met with fierce resistance from the others,

"Look, it's not our problem, man, probably just some mugging going on, or a bank heist, it'll clear off anyway."

But the mercenary IC would have none of it. He managed to gather support when he revealed that if they were to resolve the situation peacefully, the locals might reward them or something, hell, maybe even run into the authorities and get them to send the Pigs back.

If it were even possible to be sent back to the Koprulu Sector, if not then the Pigs could always do security jobs for cash just like they used to when they no longer were under Tamsen Cauley.

Alpha squad was picked for the job for 2 reasons, they're the best squad there is at the moment and the only squad at full strength without a wounded squad member. The 8 man team snaked through what looks like the back-alley to get to the source, and as a bonus, it doesn't attract unwanted attention, the people here are jumpy around them, showing up on a planet unexpectedly then charge in guns-blazing is a hell of a way to gain heat from whatever law organisation manages the planet.

They plodded further into the dark alley, the only thing between darkness surrounding them was the combat suit's quad tactical lights fixed below the helmet and chest piece.

Falks heard more gunshots,_ full-automatics ..this is gonna get ugly _mused the War Pig IC. With a flicker of hand gesture, Alpha Squad melted into the shadows, the custom navy blue paint job on their suits further masking them, as they switched off the mounted lights, visors going into night vision, targeting systems online.

Slowly they advanced, their half a ton clunky power suits surprisingly did not so much as make a single tremor with each step.

They came upon a sight of bodies...aliens and humans alike...

Some were wearing some sort of combat vests, black matted, humans and aliens with a face similar to Earth's feline animal, a cat, and unusual firearms which appeared to be carbines scattered about.

The other bodies were fully enclosed in some sort of blue skin-suit, Falks motioned to Alpha squad behind him.

_7 hostiles, 2 on walkway, 5 on ground, 3 left, 2 right, we go on my mark._

A small segment of his HUD flashed green as the squad leader acknowledged. As with the previous group, these blue guys are also a mix of wierd cat-aliens and humans. They had surrounded a fairly middle-aged human in a sharp white suits only rich pompous businessmen wore , it was white before it met contact with grime and dirt and muck.

The human, hugged what appeared to be a suitcase ever tightly in his chest, "No! Please!" begged the middle aged man.

One of those blue baddies, presumed the leader removed his helmet to reveal another of those cat-alien, he or she or _it _held a pistol, big, sleek and definitely alien in nature before pressing it firmly to the forehead of the whimpering human.

As expected by the present War Pigs, it spoke in alien tongue, but what surprised them was that the humans under it's command and the victim understood whatever Mister/Miss freak was babbling about. The human whimpered in fear and shook his head, and swore defiantly at the alien, all the while shielding the briefcase away from the Blue baddies.

* * *

><p>Zallus was getting sick of this primate's resistance, though he would find this rather...interesting for a human in another situation, but this just this begs for another outcome; a shard of metal in his head.<p>

Sure, the guy who hired him said to use extreme discretion, but...hey he could always say the bastard was armed and retaliated in self-defence.

"Please, I'll pay double whoever hired you!" moaned the human at his mercy.

"Err...boss, should we..you know take his offer, i mean he is offering..." upon seeing Zallus's ice-cold glare, the Blue Sun Operative backed down,

"Shutting up, sir."

Turning his attention back to the human, he raised the M-5 Phalanx Heavy Pistol right in front of where the human cranium would be. Before he could fire, something roared from the darkness.

_Chak-chak-chak-chakchak-chak! _

It came from almost every direction, dammit! cursed the Turian as he saw his boys fell without so much as returning a single shot, _lazy cunts! Didn't they watch the perimeter!_

He got nicked in the chest, his Kinetic barrier absorbed the first few shots before concentrated fire brought him down, 8mm steel spikes punched through his skin suit, those hard materials that made his armor simply fell fell like wet tissue and Zallus found himself being flung backwards by the brute force of the rounds that struck him.

He managed one last defiant glare at his attackers who were still cowering in the shadows of the alley before taking death by the hand and embracing him like a brother.

* * *

><p><strong>Okay, this chapter has been redone! pls RnR<strong>


	4. Chapter 3:Introductions

**2185 CE, 1925 hours**

**Omega, Terminus Systems**

* * *

><p>Eric Krestel, 25, a local from Earth's North American Sector sat on the wet gravel flat his ass, gobsmacked. The briefcase was wet in his hands. His traumatized mind was trying to rationalize what in god's name just happened. One moment there were Blue Suns, fucking around with him and the next they all lie on the ground in pieces. He sat there in the dark alley decorated with bodies squinting and panting.<p>

Squinting to find his saviours who lurks in the shadows and panting at all the adrenaline pumped into his system, if he were any older, his heart would just stop beating.

There was the sound of metal stomping on alien alloy and servos whirring plus hydraulics hissing as a handful of humanoids emerged. Friend or foe he would find out soon enough.

Christ, Look at the size of them! awed Eric mentally, they stood about a foot taller than him, towering menacingly. The heavy armored men/alien spread out forming a new perimeter, leaving one of them to walk towards Eric with each step was a loud emphasized_ Thump_!

"W..what are you," was all Eric could manage.

The visor of some sort was strikingly similar to the early 21st century human space explorer's, lifted by glove with a pneumatic _hissss!_ and a _click!_ revealing a human male, at least he think it was.

It/he extended his hand to Eric, the gargantuan rifle in his other hand. Not wanting to piss a 7'5 tall human in badass Combat armor, Eric grabbed the massive glove and felt himself being lifted up. Once he was proper, the same Heavy Combat armored guy spoke.

"You okay?"with a tang south American accent. It sounded more like "Yokay?"

The timid man could only nod. One of them walked up to one of the dead bodies and inspected a random assault rifle, the troubling thing was that the way that being handled the weapons was as if encountering the Avenger Assault rifle for the very first time.

'These guys are definitely not from around here.' Thought Eric mentally.

"Who are you?"

The leader inquired. Eric, fidgeted with his hands as his eyes fell on the oversized rifle in the dreadnought's other hand.

"I see you're looking at my gun, I ain't gonna shoot you. Just want answers, we're not around here, hell, we just got here as a matter of fact."

Eric decided to be a little bolder, hell they saved his life and they seem...nice? so...it wouldn't hurt to ask abit, right?"

"I asked you very the same question moments ago. So..um..you first,"

There was silence as a stare-down began between the Corporate Executive and the mercenary. Neither party noticed inhabitants running for shelter as storm clouds rolled in. Without warning globules of rain fell, sticking onto Eric's clothing, shoes, everywhere. The guys in power armor stood still, visors shut to keep the rain out.

The one who addressed him earlier on spoke up. His voice gravelly due to the suit's audio speakers.

"Ya' know, ain't much people I know got the balls to talk back ta' a War Pig. Only kind that does are either morons or crazy, either way they end up fragged. So which one are you?"

His rifle was pointed slightly in his direction and Eric knew he was royally fucked.

Again.

The being before him lowered the massive gun before continuing, much to Eric's relief.

"Heheh, kid just fuckin' with ya'. Franklin Toretto, War Pigs Sergeant First Class. wha' about you?"

"Eric, Eric Krestel, I...I work for SyTech Corporation."

"Right, Mister Krestel, mind telling me what's with the flashy mercs?"

"Hired mercs probably from a rivalling company, they're after what's inside the case."

Someone from the back piped in.

"So amigo, what's in the bag?"

Eric swallowed after realising he'd been gathering saliva in his throat for a while.

"Uhh...classified."

The head honcho spoke up once more.

"Neva' mind that, start from the beginning."

Oh boy, thought Eric, where to begin?

"...And then those guys from the Blue Suns caught up with me, the security enforcers my company hired were all dead and they had me, well that was before you showed up. Thanks, again Franklin uh, sir, for saving my life."

"Kid, think nothin' of it, just...just doing our civic duty."

A couple of Pigs snickered at that over the Comms.

Falks' mind was still a bit numb at the thought of aliens, as in aliens with a big 'A,' having an attitude and personality so similar to a human, so...humanlike and working alongside humans as Mercenaries.

These guys are way alot more tolerable than the Zerg. Or the Protoss. Though this Eric mentioned them cat-aliens, the Turians, still held grudges against humanity for the First Contact war, and the humans, them.

Falks was gonna have to do a bit more researching on that, and judging by the fact nobody knows what a CMC-Power Suit is, they must've been transported to somewhere FAR, FAR, FAR away in the galaxy where humans and a conglomeration of Xenos live together in peace all the while oblivious to the Zerg ,Protoss and the Terrans duking it out in the K-Sector.

Savchenko, the squad leader of Alpha, came up to Falks, his C-14 strapped to his back magnetically and in his hands were a handful of Avengers and Mattock Assault rifles neatly folded.

"Check it out boss, bet we could sell this shit for creds."

Falks broke into a wide toothy grin before nodding in approval. These weapons could come in handy, although they're way too small for the War Pigs' trigger fingers, they might be useful in funneling cash for whatever base of operations the War Pigs wish to establish in this new place.

"I like the sound of that, but first things first, we gotta get this lil fella back to whoever he works for, mighty unhealthy of him to go delivery boy if these damn yokels are gunning for him."

"Hey, i heard that, and resent that! Plus, you haven't told me where ya' guys from," protested Eric.

"But thanks for offering to help me, I think my superiors would be happy to discuss payment should i get this important document over to my employers," continued the business man as he grabbed a strange looking pistol from one of the dead mercenaries and stuffed it into his white suit.

The giant in front of him shrugged,

"Hell yeah, sure, there's more of my guys out in the back, 30 of us altogether and one...irregular. But i think they can wait on us a while longer, some of my guys are wounded though."

Eric slowly nodded, awe evident on his face when he heard there were more of these walking tanks, and some of them were wounded. Judging from their tech, he shuddered what kind of foe could actually put the hurt on thees guys.

Without further delay, Eric then activated his omni-tool, to send a message to the Board Of Directors their package would be delayed, he realised the War Pigs were now staring at him, no, his Omni-Tool as if never seen one before.

"What, Omni-Tool, you guys don't have one?" the armoured mercenaries all shook their heads.

"Kid, we just got our asses transported thousands of fucking lightyears from one end of the galaxy to another, up until now, we have never encountered guns that fire grains of sand at you or aliens who might damn well be our long lost cousins! How the hell do you think we're supposed to know what an Omni-Tool is!?"

The corporate man stumbled back, surprised from Franklin's sudden outburst.

"It's like an advanced PDA, does almost every kind of feature a techno geek would have wet dreams of, everyone in the galaxy has one. No...i get it you guys aren't even from this galaxy. Maybe, once I'm safe and the briefcase is no longer my concern, maybe I can get the bosses acquire and you and you boys an Omni-Tool, assuming it syncs with your armor and all."

Falks was intrigued by the technology here, they don't have access to mini cold fusion reactors, or even powered suits, but they really got some nifty gizmos, the Omni-Tool for example.

Already he could see a few members from Alpha eyeing the Omni-Tool in a predatory fashion. Just as he and his compatriots were about to leave, one of the dead Blue sun's trooper's Comm crackled and fizzed, it was in a Turian dialect, so to the War Pigs it sounded nothing more than garbled shit but Eric had an Omni-Tool and with it's translator technology, he understood every word said which that made his eyes widen in fear. Again.

"We have to leave! Now!...More Blue Suns on the way!"

That got Falks and Alpha Squad rushing through the narrow and long alley of Omega.

Subtlety and stealth long abandoned.

Just as they came into the streets, sporadic gunfire erupted, good thing the streets were emptied. The moment Blue Sun reinforcements showed up guns blazing, every soul, human, alien began fleeing for their lives. These men have killed for less so it wasn't a priority if civillians were killed in the skirmish.

"Positive ID your targets, we don't wanna hit any poor sum'bitch!" Sev growled as his targeting systems scanned the vicinity for the hidden shooters.

"Got a lock, Jeeesus H Christ they're everywhere!"

"Contact! Left side, second building, Entrance, engage!" roared Sevchenko, immediately 8mm spikes blanketed the combat zone.

A few stray Suns caught in the storm of spikes were spun round by the shattering impact were plastered into the ground. They were relatively unharmed if not suffering from heavy concussion. They would be out of the fight for now.

"Holy shit, these guys got shields!" screamed someone over the channel.

Falks saw a Blue Sun operative took one in the face, a bluish wall flickered in front of him for a few seconds before dissipating. And said operative was seen on the floor in shock rubbing his head where the round had hit.

'Personal shields? Damn, they really got the fancy shit.' Thought Franklin as his shots missed their marks, the agile streamlined figures that were the Blue Suns would pop out of cover, snap off some shots before hunkering down, thankfully, not even mass accelerated shots could penetrate thick neo-steel plating.

It served nothing more than pissing the War Pigs off.

Falks reloaded before whaling away at the Suns, his C-14 barking harshly adding to the orchestra of _chak-chak-chak_ from other C-14s going off.

Blue Suns were in the buildings, the streets, behind cars, everywhere!

The War Pigs put up one helluva fight however, they wouldn't go down this easy, compared to the Zerg, Protoss and other merc groups, these shitheads were peanut shavings.

Even though with the advantage of kinetic barriers, the 8mm depleted uranium and other custom fabricated spikes proved to be fatal nontheless, tearing away shielding at frightening speed, ripping flesh and limbs off as targets died in a painful, bloody and gory death.

When it looked as though the War Pigs were winning, more hostile reinforcements quickly replenished the ranks of the fallen and soon the War Pigs were pushed back deeper into the alley, with a cowering Eric Walter at the back.

"Protect Mr Krestel! Donelly, Sheen, gimme' suppressing fire on those 2 Tangos by the verandah!"

Rasped Sav, as he used his Combat Shield as cover, and firing with his second hand.

"I'm a little busy dude...Shit!" retorted Donelly as he took some hits to the chest plate, and was flung backwards with a cry of anger.

"On it," replied Sheen.

Whatever these guys used as ammo, packed a mean punch, every hit, felt as though something really big and heavy crashed against you but at least it couldn't punch through CMC power armor which Sav was really thankful for.

The War Pigs were pinned in the stinking filthy alley, gunfire and fast moving metals zipped and whizzed all around them. Falks overturned the nearby dumpster, or at least he think it was, and used it as makeshift cover, up until now he still didn't know what the fuck happened, how or why.

Gunfire was erupting all around him, Blue Suns, of course he couldn't be bothered by their names so he dubbed them blue bastards, were pinning him down.

"Sev! Break off 2 guys and flank their side, we're getting our asses handed in a fucking pina colata!"

Hans and Dreddovich left their entrenched positions and jogged deeper into the alley, from there they snaked their way until they were on the left flank of the Blue Suns. The Suns were all too preoccupied in shooting the shit out of their strange adversaries, they never saw 2 armored figures tossing grenades into their midst till it was too late.

_WHUMP!_

The explosives detonated and a fresh batch of screams pierced the cacophony of gunfire. Blue Suns were thrown in dissarray, some of their units shifting and breaking cover to protect their exposed flanks against Dreddovich and Hans.

"Chyort, here they come!" cursed the Russian merc as he banged a clip on his helmet before slapping it home.

"Tear em' apart Pigs!"

_Chak-chak-chak-chak-chak!_

Sev's sensor marked a guy armed with a really big and nasty looking sniper. And the sniper was looking right at him! Sav raised his rifle to cut him down, just as the sniper raised his, and before both the hostile or Sev could fire, the sniper was riddled by hundreds of spikes. Chunks of armor and meat fell out of the sky. Sev looked to his left and saw Donnelly giving him the thumbs up.

Sev replied a middle finger at the merc for stealing his kill.

As good as a squad of War Pigs are, it really never hurts to call in reinforcements of your own when outnumbered. Yeah, the Pigs were outnumbered 3 to 1, but they sure as hell weren't outgunned.

"Hey, assholes, now would be a good time to show up!"

Grunted Falks to General Comm as enemy fire peppered his shoulder plates.

"Beta and Charlie squads are on their way sir, ETA 30 seconds. Delta stayed behind to watch the wounded. We ran into some new friends, sir, they're with us for the ride temporarily."

It was Eddie Finnick, and by the sound of the gunfire in the background he's just around a corner, so to speak.

"Funny, Ed, we too, along with lotsa' faggots wanting to kill us but any help would be appreciated. Guess what, we got a job, War Pigs are back!"

Another War Pig butt in their conversation, "Already, sir? hot-damn, we-"

The connection was cut as an explosion flattened the ground and kicked up debris and dirt. Falks had to get flat on the ground as hostiles had deployed RPG crewmen at the tops of nearby buildings, his HUD displayed everyone still breathing and targeting systems were already locking onto the new adversaries.

Someone yelled over the comms.

"Shit, they're boxing us inwith heavy weapons!"

Franklin grunted as he stood up.

"Alpha squad take out those RPGs, they're our top priority!"

**2185 CE, 19:40 hours**

**Omega, Terminus Systems**

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><p>Another 5 minutes of blood, firepower and outright dirty name calling plus a good round of fragging later, Alpha was joined by more combat-ready War Pigs along with a large group of armed aliens and humans in different colored suits.<p>

The RPG crewmen had taken some casualties but they were still in business, launching High Explosive rockets once in a while to even things up. And with the sudden increase in War Pigs numbers, the morale for the Suns dropped dramatically. To add salt to the fucking wound, Aria's men were on their side.

Immediately the Blue Suns channel was flooded with requests to pull back, forget these damn power armored guys, it was not a smart move to go against Aria.

* * *

><p>'Freelancers,' thought Falks as he watched one of the cat-aliens or Turian, as they call themselves, toss a grenade which proved to be the fragmentation variant, flush out a couple of shooters behind a damaged vehicle.<p>

Finally, after more effort was put into the ass-kicking, the Blue Suns began retreating. Finally figuring out that one man and a briefcase is not a cause worth dying for, maybe if the reward was higher, they'd have stayed a bit longer.

As everyone recollected themselves, a pale faced Eric came shambling out, hyperventilating, briefcase in hand, pistol in the other.

"Oh please, don't mind me, while I sit here and have a heart attack."

One of the armed freelancers, human gave an order and all the mercs took aim at the War Pigs, who in turn returned the favour. Eric Krestel was still sitting on the pavement, taking deep breaths thinking that he had just tangoed with death and survived. All the while oblivious to the situation unfolding.

"Drop your weapons, we're under Aria's jurisdiction, put down the fucking guns."

Falks could tell from the audio scrambler in his HUD the guy who said it was scared out of his mind. Who wouldn't? You might as well fight naked when taking on a power armored monstrosity when all you have a skin-suit and flimsy kinetic barriers.

"Who the hell's Aria?"

Said Billy, as he puffed out smoke from his cigarette. Good question, just who is Aria?

"The merc spoke once more, his tone more confident and bordered on arrogance.

"You see this place? This is Omega, and on Omega, Aria's word is law. Omega is Aria, and Aria is Omega, don't you forget that."

Falks didn't know who this Aria is but by having a really large network of informants and armed mercs means she's one of them crime lords or powerful people you really don't want to fuck around with, kind of reminds him of Dead Man's Rock, full of cutthroats and shady crime lords.

"So we doing this easy, or must we bring you to her in pieces?"

Most of the War Pigs were fidgety, they'd just landed on a place so alien to them, met wierd freaky aliens, got in a firefight now they have to meet some self-proclaimed king. And there still was the issue of wounded. As if sensing that, the same human merc spoke out.

"Don't worry, we brought transports out back for your injured boys, they might be able to sustain their weight.."

With a nod, Falks let the merc do his thing as Delta squad came by carrying battered CMC power armored men.

One of Delta squad's member looked at the carnage done before cursing, "Dammit, and we didn't even get to whoop some ass along the way, igniting laughter from both War Pigs and Aria's associates.

The ride there was silent, Pigs spent their time filling up their magazines with spikes or whispering over the comms their opinions about this whole situation.

As the Pigs got out of the anti-grav transports, much to the relief of the drivers, as they feared their weight would cause setbacks along the way. Eric tagged along, for protection under his unofficial security force. The wounded stayed behind with Aria's boys.

The War Pigs could only stare in wonder before the building before them, people and races from all walks of life were impatiently waiting outside to get in, the bouncer was a Krogan, and he felt the urge to go against his duty as bouncer and fight one of those armored forms as they came up to him, these guys would make a good sparing buddy. They had both size and intimidation, something a Krogan would see as potential fos. But upon seeing they were escorted by Aria's boys behind, he gave a nod at them, and let them pass, causing a wave of protests from the people in queue.

"Did you see that thing? My god it's huge!" whispered someone from Bravo.

"Yeah well, not as big as a Marauder..." someone snidely replied.

True, a Marauder stood proud at almost 9 feet tall. A marine at 7. And that hulk of a monster they saw working as a bouncer slightly taller than a marine.

Inside was...well big, with techno music blasting the very foundations of the poor building, men and women dancing drinking laughing and sometimes crying, the atmosphere was vibrant in a way, Falks saw aliens resembling female humans in scanty outfits, doing...pole dancing?

They were rather attractive, if not for the tentacles for hairs, they might have passed as albino humans due to their baby blue skin. The War Pigs conversed mostly on the aliens on the dance floor, and it was decided by the group that Falks would have the honor of fucking one of them of which he says they're not ready for the raw sex appeal he would unleash.

Finally, they went up some stairs, a lot, actually and came up to a nice spot where one had an entire view of the entrances, dance floors, everything. There was one of those blue skinned aliens again, this time, she wasn't a dancer, she had their backs facing them, only the guards were, as they processed the War Pigs.

Even though the War Pigs outnumbered the guards almost 3 to one, they knew they would not get far considering this Aria had a vast array of mercs and firepower at her disposal. A new alien stepped out to greet them, this one was armed with a Heavy Pistol, and had quadruple eyes, almost causing a number of Pigs to point out and harass him, 4 eyes.

"xths, dsdsdsdsd hdjedbjhwsb, sdfsdfsvsjjdhjfhw..." it said.

Eric piped in from behind, "He says to holster your weapons, Aria wants to talk to Mister Franklin only."

Nodding to the other pigs, they reluctantly strapped their C-14s to their magnetic holsters at the back of their suits as Falks stepped up to the blue alien. Not to be rude to this Aria, he popped open his visor, his HUD disappearing from view, only suit integrity status and air filtration running.

"Welcome," spoke the alien in perfect English, with a North American accent as she turned around.

"To Omega, stranger, and I, am Omega."


	5. Chapter 4: New job, new upgrades

**This chapter is redone! have a go at this, hopefully you readers can digest it far more easier than before it was edited...**

**Plus RAW Footage of Commander Janette .Delilah Shepard in the next chapter! :D**

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><p><strong>2185 CE, 2005 hours<strong>

**Terminus Systems**

**Omega, Afterlife**

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><p>As the techno beat from Afterlife pounded the very shaking foundations of the establishment itself, the War Pigs were in grim silence as the Asari before them announced who she was, a self-proclaimed ruler of Omega. Were they awed by the fact that she had the gall to call herself Omega?<p>

Why not? she owns every single business going on, directly and indirectly, big or small, both legal and illegal. She used the silence to study this Franklin Toretto or Falks as he prefer to call himself.

A lone Salarian approached Aria. He bowed to her all the way similar to how the Japanese would to one another before whispering something in her ear. The Asari furrowed her eyebrows at such news given to her. She then dismissed him with a simple hand gesture and a nod understanding the situation. Now that was out of the way, Aria began mentally dissecting these 'War Pigs' standing before her.

And their leader.

While the others had their eerie gold opaque Visors snapped shut, only Falks had his face exposed, a hard jaw, some burns and skin grafts showing, artificial plastering down on the edge of his nose and a cybernetic implant showing on the base of his cranium signifying this man was more likely experimented upon. A bio engineered soldier.

'Is that what they are?' pondered the crime lord.

He appears to be somewhere between 30-40 years of human age, where they are at their prime unlike herself, a few hundred years more to go until she reaches stage 3 of the Asari life cycle.

His eyes are steely, always ready for combat, and icy blue iris, most women would find him very attractive were he ten years younger. His armor was cracked, chipped and dented in some places suggesting battle scars. This man standing before her built for war.

The silence was becoming more awkward by the moment. Aria cleared her throat, catching the attention of the War Pigs, and Falks. He seemed rather blank, as though unsure of what's going on. She couldn't blame him. Ending up millions of lightyears away from wherever you hail from is enough to fuck up anyone's day.

"Have a seat,"

She gestured next to herself. The armored human standing before her promptly shook his head, "Sorry ma'am I don't think your sofa is capable of...accommodating my weight," Most people would feel honored or even outright piss themeselves when given the offer to sit with her. But Falks? He tells a joke. Funny yet true. She cracked a rare grin showing amusement.

"Well in that case you'll just stand, fine by you?"

A nod, good, then she will continue to business. "Right, as you already know, I'm one of those people in your books you really don't wanna fuck around with," Her voice became stern. Falks shurgged nonchalantly. "How did you get in Omega without me knowing? And about your suits, from what my associates have informed me, they can withstand mass accelerated rounds, I wanna know what materials you use, everything related to you and your suits."

Falks replied coolly,

"Well ma'am, I don't think you'd be interested in-."

"Oh I'm very interested in highly advanced people who appeared in my home uninvited and stirred alot of shit."

The War Pig IC tried to keep his story short and sweet and left out stuff he figured to be either sensitive or classified. The Pigs were annoyed, that Aria didn't let them move about and were put under strict observation by her guards, all of which were Batarian and they all had a select distaste for humans...power suited or not.

* * *

><p>Eric Krestel the corporate man was busy dissing his douchebag of a guard. Simply put, the man hates Batarians and the feeling's mutual towards the human.<p>

"Can we go now?"

"No."

"How about now?"

"No..."

"When can we leave?"

"Not until where Aria says you can leave."

"Aria says we can leave,"

"Very funny, human"

"...Fuck you four eyes"

"What did you say to me?"

"Four eyes, four fucking eyes!"

"Shut up! The only reason you're still alive is because Aria says so!"

"...Hey do you have four testacles too?"

"Shut. The. Fuck. Up."

* * *

><p>The guards were cycled every 5 minutes before the current one could do something stupid. Meanwhile, with Franklin and Aria...<p>

"...And then when we became conscious, we find ourselves in a city filled with humans and xenos, we tried to get our asses together, you know, assess the situation, fubar though it may be, then we heard gunshots, screaming civvies running, me and the boys investigated and found this guy," nodding over to Eric, who smiled nervously and was still hugging the briefcase, his pistol butt protruding from his suit. The Batarian guard beside him growling in frustration

"From there, we fought our way through the Blue Suns, met your boys and the rest as you know is history."

Aria and her guards exchanged glances, this guy has either got the guts or crazy enough to lie to her, of which the consequences were always unpleasant or maybe, just maybe he actually was telling the truth, either way the War Pigs received incredulous looks. One of her guards, snorted.

"Hur-hur-hur, that has to be the best made up story I've heard in my entire life, wait till-"

_THWACK!_

Aria's right hand man, Gharka growled from behind him as he folded his pistol back to compact size.

"Aria didn't ask for your opinion, now get the fuck back in line," Of course the Pigs didn't understand a single word due to the words being spoken in native Batarian tongue so they just stood by and watched the Batarian guard got his head smacked, for they still lacked translator technology only an Omni-Tool could provide or a simple brain implant surgery. Aria looked to her guard with amusement plastered on her eerily humanoid face before becoming stern to the War Pig IC.

"I apologize on behalf of my associates, they need more disciplining, Gharka I trust will teach the man his place. Please continue."

"We took out the Blue Sun mercs, saved his ass, got an unofficial contract with him for doing what his security mercs didn't accomplish. I'll just be frank here, we're not looking for trouble here, we just wanna get back to the Koprulu Sector but it looks like we're gonna be stuck here for a while. We're gonna need creds to survive, though we have plans on getting the cash flowing but we ain't got no place to lay low, no food, no water, our ammo's getting low, we need to repair our suits, and...we need a way home."

More silence as Aria and her guards pondered on. She rubbed her chin with her slender fingers.

"I see, this complicates things, but, as you've said, you want out of this place, and back to...wherever you came from, no doubt the Council will have news of this but they're no threat to me. I'll let the fact you created a bit of chaos in that district of Omega and you got here without my permission me knowing, slide, considering you're special case but that does not leave out your technology..."

Falks tried to intervene to refuse that last bit in sharing technology with unknowns, much less hippy alien-crime lords.

"I know what you''re going to say, the tech not ready for this place, blah,blah,blah, so I'm proposing an offer."

The War Pigs tried shuffling as close to her as possible to listen, only to be stopped by Aria's guards, assault rifles at the ready and their angry-alien-game faces on.

"I may not be able to get back to...wherever you came from, but I can provide you credits and a place for you to stay, basic necessities, no rent charged. This much I can provide and in return, you help me do a little house cleaning, keeping the peace here, enforcing my will upon the denizens on Omega, ensure homages and debts pid on time. As a bonus, you'll still be free to be employed by anyone you wish should you want to continue operating as mercenaries. Although you may be in for tough competition. Eclipse, Blue Suns and Blood Pack are the top merc gangs and are running a trade monopoly here, they won't appreciate FNGs fucking up their little empire."

Falks raised an armored finger to scratch his chin, the other mercenaries under him shifted, no doubt discussing this to each other via communicators in their power suits. To join or not to join? As tempting as the deal may sounds, it was similiar to making a deal with a devil or sh-devil in this case. There were too much to consider and too much at stake. Franklin made his decision.

"Don't worry, those Blue Sun pussies can't hit the broad side of a barn anyways, even their firepower can't even punch through our armor. About your offer, it's mighty tempting, but for the sake of asking, what happens if we refuse?"

Aria smiled...sinisterly, it lasted a few seconds before she sank back onto the sofa with a dark and wicked look. "It's gonna go two ways," She held up her index finger. "One, You'll be free to go, but on your own here with the cutthroats on Omega."

She held up her middle finger, "Two, I'll just have you and your compatriots dead, take the technology for myself and reverse engineer it for my own private purposes. Your choice, War Pig."

The Pigs didn't like it not one bit, they drew their C-14 rifles, ready to turn this bitch and her compatriots into bloody pastes. The guards did the same, and Aria's hands glowed an unnatural ultramarine energy pulsating up and down.

Realising this Aria could be some kind of Psionic, the platoon strength Pigs begrudgingly stood down. Apparently psychics existed in this place as well, and the War Pigs knew psychics are bad. Very bad.

"Alright then, we'll take your generous offer, yeah we'll do it. Until we can find a way back home." Falks was still uneasy interacting with aliens that had the personality of a human, hell, the thought of a bar run by aliens is just mind blowing.

Aria stood up and extended a hand, formal human greeting which suprised Falks a little.

"Aria T. Loak, the Big Boss, a pleasure to have you working for me,"

Grinning ear to ear, Falks also stood up and returned the gesture.

"Master Sergeant Franklin Toretto, or Falks, War Pigs, at your service ma'am,"

Another half an hour was spent hammering out more details, payment, new living area, of which the Pigs got a whole building to themselves, considering there's 30 of them.

Later on, medigel was administered to the wounded. The Pigs were not that impressed with the seemingly interesting piece of medical technology considering Terran Medics pumped nanites into the wounded via radiation treatment which would seal and heal even the most gruesome of injuries in seconds.

Soon the War Pigs found themselves unpacking their stuff in their new and temporary home.

* * *

><p>Once the power suited men were escorted out, Aria opened an omni tool channel to her...benefactors. Powerful supporters you might say.<p>

_'Advisers'_ affirmed Asari to herself mentally at the thought of them._ 'They live to serve me. Nothing more. Nothing less._'

The voice of Isaac Hecox was the first to be heard. His corporation does trade in arms with Aria, and provide basic to advanced training towards her men, turning them from ragtag rabble of armed warbands into a cohesive fighting force armed and ready to actually start an invasion with a nearby star system.

"Is this wise? We know nothing of them and yet you hired them on such whim. Have you ever considered how they could actually seek to eradicate you internally? That has happened several times, Aria, same bloody mistakes are made and everytime we have to pull your arse out of the fire. The Stock market is going into another full blown fucking depression and I can't have my number one income flatline just like that."

Aria had to restrain every fibre of her being from lashing out. This bastard has no right to judge her actions, all he does is sign paperwork and host meetings with pompous corporate fucks instead of governing an empire, if you'd call it that and running a fucking multi-trillion business at the same time.

"Hecox I am perfectly capable of running my own station without you or anyone telling me how, I've been doing it for over hundreds of years and it has become a way of life than a job actually. The next time you go out of line, I will have you flayed alive in front of your family. I'm sure little Susan would be destroyed at the sight of her 'daddy', a powerful man and which she highly respects being humiliated right in front of her."

There was a pause at the line before Isaac replied. Nervously. Aria intends to make it so happen if she wishes. She has done it before in 2172.

"...Yes ma'am, forgive me."

"You are forgiven, know your place, Mr Hecox. You live to serve my whims. Now, anything else you wish to discuss?"

A Turian made himself known over the channel. Aria scowled when she heard her voice. Vindiks Straenus, owner of a multi billionare corporation which dabbles in medicine and biological hazards, Aria's business partner in terms of lab rats. Aria trades live specimen for Vindik's corporation to run their little experiments on and in turn, he supplies her with drugs of several varieties. Aria detests Vindiks for his kiss-ass-behaviours.

"Ms , my-"

"Cut the pleasantries Vindiks, just give it to me."

"Y-yes, of course, Aria, the package you asked for is on it's way. I assume you have the facility to house-it?"

"You insult me, Vindiks. Just how potent is this new stuff?"

The Turian replied rather boastfully.

"Well, we have tested it on Krogans you supplied us and even they are hooked to its effects, plus as a bonus, this drug we've synthesized is fully useable by any species, even Quarians can't keep their grubby claws off of it." At the end of Vindik's channel, he was grinning.

* * *

><p>The building was located deep within the heart of Omega, and was silent as a graveyard...a controversy considering Omega's similarity to Los Angeles in the 1950s, loud and vibrant. This was because Afterlife's blaring could be heard for miles and yet not even a jad of techno beat could be heard. Peace and quiet...definitely not what the Pigs preferred but it'll do.<p>

They needed the rest after 16 hours of continued fighting against endless hordes of biological monstrosities hell bent on infesting and assimilating every life form in the galaxy.

The eager War Pigs took their time, running through the building's functions, taking great care in fixing and checking the plumbings and power circuits.

PFC Woods and his other squadmate, PFC Kaufmann were up on power duty, because way before being employed as the new generation of War Pigs grunts, both were once electricians...believe it or not.

"Fuck me, the power's dead for over twenty years judging by the looks of the damn circuitry and the holo panels ain't helping either, damn xeno tech."

Kaufmann took a look before suggesting they go around the other unused buildings to scavenge for parts, worry about holo panel later.

"Huh, might just work but its gonna take the whole day, fuck this, cmon Erick lets go."

The two power suited men broke the news to the others, whom all groaned their displease at the situation. Erick and Woods went through the first hab, abandoned by its occupants. They systematically went through the holographic power breaker.

"Carter, I think this button powers up the breaker."

"You sure?"

_"Ja, mein freun, _I am sure of it. Look."

He tapped the holo button and true enough the lights flash on. A second later, Kaufmann turns it back off.

"Nice work bro, okay, help me cut the parts out." says Carter as he unsheaths a penknife, his giant gauntlets dwarfing the tiny cutting tool. Ever slowly yet steady, the two men got the appropriate bits and pieces by the end of the afternoon. Power was restored and clean drinkable water was flowing once more since the last twenty-six years it was used.

* * *

><p>Two Pigs tumbled on the floor, brawling over the right to use the only remaining shower that was unoccupied. The others were good audiences by calling bets and giving shouts of encouragement.<p>

"Your ass is mine, Salleh!"

"I'm gonna rip your balls off and feed it to a 'Ling!"

They continued pummeling each other, unaware the shower was now occupied by none other than the GHOST.

* * *

><p>Combat suits were lined up, one by one as the mercs took their time bathing. Falks and a fireteam of Alpha Squad, Alpha 1-3 escorted Eric Krestel safely to his superiors, in a corporate building where men and women of different races sat in desks and typed away, the scene set was similar to an office building on Tarsonis Franklin visited many years ago as a youth.<p>

The receptionist who knew Eric had the shock of her life when Eric entered the building, drenched in blood of various species, Turian mostly and he was not alone. There were armed men with him and they were very menacing in appearance. Actually, this had turned many heads onto Eric and company's direction.

A few words were exchanged, a call was made and the Board of Directors was ready to have an audience with them.

They went up the top floor where a secretary was expecting them, she escorted them to the meeting room where Eric handed the case to the secretary before sitting down on one of the chairs.

Falks shook hands with the board of Directors and soon exchanges were on their way, this time the War Pigs were not in power armor but in standard civillian clothing therefore the Directors did not expecting anything out of the ordinary; they had lied to them saying they were freelancers who just arrived on Omega and employed by Aria, the last bit was true.

Soon enough, the meeting came to an end and the Pigs had negotiated their way into getting 15 million credit chits neatly sealed in an envelope, considering they protected a vital Corporate Assets and provided they never speak of what was in the documents.

* * *

><p><strong>2185 CE, 2215 hours<strong>

**Terminus Systems**

**Omega, Afterlife**

"Huh, I thought I was gonna lose my job or something," chuckled Eric as he opened the door of the building as the mercs and himself shuffled out, "Nah you got ya' knickers in a bunch, anyways, I've been thinking of getting them Omni-Tools, you say it's standard in this galaxy, right? so...maybe we should get one, too, and them Kinetic barriers, and-"

The corporate employee quickly cut in, "Yeah, yeah but first things first, I gotta get new clothes first," causing the Pigs to laugh, startling a few passers-by.

* * *

><p><strong>2185 CE, 2219 hours<strong>

**Unknown System**

**Unknown Planet**

Meanwhile, deep within a secret Cerberus facility, the Illusive Man stared intently at the feed from a security camera captured on Omega.

More groups of those unknown humans in that bulky power armor. He sifted through several photos and snapshots of those power suited men, it seems they were somehow transported here from an unknown time, Eden Prime, the Citadel, and now, Omega, if humanity or Cerberus had access to their technology, they would have an edge over the Reapers in terms of infantry. "Opportunity..." he mumbled.

This is certainly a blessing for humanity and such blessings should not be allowed to slip away.


	6. Chapter 5:The War Pigs

2185 CE, 2005 hours...

Omega, Hell's Teeth

Day 1...

* * *

><p>They were gone for only 5 hours, by the time they returned to the building Aria had leased for them in the run down, quiet surrounding. A perfect place for laying low and the boys had dubbed it, Hell's Teeth. True to the name,<p>

Hell's teeth had severalwindows making it an excellent killzone, able to box just about anything into a crossfire. Alpha 1-1 were still complaining about the weight in their hands, thanks to Eric as their guide, they managed to bargain with Turian dealers, Volus merchants and other businessmen for up-to-date Kinetic Barriers and Omni-tools all at the price of 95000 credit chits. They were rather fortunate, a total of 7 of the Pigs had a degree of training in Military Engineering, therefore understood the ways of the CMC-400.

The Knietic Barrier Generators, were hooked right next to the fusion reactors, at first, the suits didn't recognise the generators, therefore did not activate, and the HUDs each displayed warning of foreign intrusion causing the 7 engineers to reconfigure the

whole design again, much to their dismay. Meanwhile, the other War Pigs, now devoid of their armor were up for a game of poker, hell, they hadn't this much of peace since Dead Man's Port and that was over a year ago.

Eric had left Hell's Teeth considering he had night shift till' next sunrise. Falks and his original squad, Delta, were cracking mean jokes about the Citadel Races, a number of the Pigs were researching with their Omni-Tools that was temporarily fixed onto their wrists, to look for arms dealers on Omega that could procure a ammunition for them, since their weapons run on gas-magazine system, instead of heatsinks and mass accelerators and element zero.

Grenades were divided equally, each man had his share of smoke grenades, Flashbangs and Frags. The weapons pried from the dead were studied by a couple of Pigs, Ned and Frost, who were master-at-arms once in a ship's armoury, they stripped the

weapons and took notes, what makes them tick, what do they run on, of course s interesting as it might sound, the Pigs, however found it the most boring job given by Falks ever.

The Ghost was at a corner, helmet on his right hand, his left holding acigarette, his C-10 Canister Rifle magnetically strapped to his back. Most of the Pigs steered clear away from the psionic assasin, he was taking a long drag, despite the fact it was old, old enough to lack flavour whatsoever, all of a sudden, a slurred voice jumped him.

"Having fun?"

He paused, before returning to his smoking business, his psionic gift telling him it was just the War-Pig in charge.

"Franklin Toretto,"

He rasped with a curt nod. The mercenary set his back against the wall, just like the Ghost was doing, before resuming his conversation.

"I didn't see you in the caves, back on Char, so why're you here with us?"

The Ghost, a man that looked way too young to even join the military looked Falks in the eyes, and frankly, it's scaring the shit out of him, with his zombie-like stare,

"Wouldn't you wanna know?"

* * *

><p>Falks collapsed onto the bed, he was the sole occupant of the room, unlike the other pigs who had a roommate each.<p>

Ten minutes of getting info from that Ghost had really starting to get to his head, which of course he had gone for a round of cursing seconds before losing consciousness,

"Creepy ass faggot, motherf-zzz..."

The next day was a flurry of activity, still no luck on the kinetic barrier generators, somehow the Suit's built in computers were resisting synchronization with the generators, Kessler, the appointed in charge of the engineers had to call it a day, he stayed up all night working out a solution, while the rest of his team soldiered on. Other than that, Bravo squad had gone off to collect the first shipment of 8mm steel tipped spikes, Weiss, rifleman from Alpha had suggested orders for hollow point and armor piercing ammunition for that extra kick, since the steel tipped spikes do little more than maim, of course the Pigs were up for the idea of having a trick or two up their sleeve.

So Falks set him for specifications on said ammunitions to their supplier, a shady arms dealing group known as _"Red Tails,_" they dabble in weapons development not just selling them on the black market.

The Ghost was nowhere to be found, though he promised Falks to not wonder off, and to follow his orders until a proper Dominion superior can replace him.

Falks himself was busy playing target practise in his combat suit, though the power armors still had a perfect 100% integrity, he was hoping if they could hire a technician, one who has resources to replicate neo-steel, and patch the suits up when they get banged down. He let the spike fly and got rewarded with the dummy's head explode in a shower of visceral red paint.

"Good shot, sir!"

Cheered one of the newbies from Delta, Private Travis "Black' Dollohorf. He was there to help reload the rifle for him, the other shooters scowled and complained he should stop using his targeting systems.

Minutes went on, in the shooting range, until Warren Birth, rifleman of Charlie squad and engineer for the attachment of the kinetic barrier generator onto the CMC-400s came barging in.

"Sir, we got it working,"

The entire War Pigs mercenaries including the Ghost, now known as LT. Swash, flooded the working workplaces where the suits are being worked on. There was whooping, laughter, whispering, all kinds of noises capable of being made by man. Finally, Falks called for a vote who should be the test subject, he did so just to shut the Pigs up, true to their word, War Pigs are the noisiest, most nefarious and yet, the most badasses of them all, a lucky Peter "Diamond" Rodriguez got the title test subject, he was always the first guy who wanted a piece of the ass-kicking and the last guy who want out, so it was no surprise there he got voted in.

It's natural to feel fear when you are about to be shot at, Peter was in fact feeling a crap ton of it and having second thoughts of actually diving in headfirst.

There was another reason to feel fear, one of the engineers pointed out the Kinetic Barriers may not function as according to plan, and Peter really did not want to become a casualty of an accident, those 8mm hollow point spikes used for the test really kicked ass and should the Kinetic Barrier fail to hold, would not only eviscerate the suit, but leave an exit wound big enough for a Zergling to jump through.

He trailed his eyes on the upper right corner of his HUD, where the Kinetic Barrier shielding was displayed as a long and slim rectangular blue bar.

"Peter you ready?"

It was the shooter himself, Corporal Carter Woods, Rifleman of Bravo squad. Peter couldn't back out now, not in front of his squadmates where they would for sure, tease his failed bravado. He could only managed a quick nod, shut his visor and began praying like a madman.

"Alright, test in 5...4...3...2...1...Mark!"

Peter closed his eyes._ Chak_! then... silence. The War Pigs stood there, waiting for Peter's reaction, while the merc himself had slowly opened his eyes, he found himself still upright, no searing pain or blood all over him.

He looked over the display and saw the kinetic barrier was slashed to 2/3 it'soriginal length, hollow points are real nasty indeed for a third of the barrier was gone in just one shot. With a sigh of relief, he popped open his visor and laughed, hysterically, the other Pigs were too busy whooping and exchanging credits to notice.

* * *

><p>2185 CE,<p>

Omega, Terminus Systems

2 months, 1 day after first contact...

* * *

><p>The War Pigs had made themselves known in the galaxy as one of the most notorious and dangerous of all mercenary groups, they have carved a bloody empire of their own, several gangs and rival mercenaries have gone against them in combat, but very few survive the battles.<p>

The Pigs are almost every month in the newspaper headlines and debated about in Citadel talk shows, many were wondering where did they get their hands on such advanced technology such as miniature fusion reactors, and the Powered Suits.

Although most renounced scientists dismissed those claims as over-exaggerated delusions of rag-tag security forces yet the evidence of thier existence was utterly overwhelming, then again, if someone were to be researching on said technology, the Citadel, Spectres, STGs would be the first to know, as well as the Illusive Man and the Shadow Broker.

Everyone knew where they were, but most steered clear from them, in the span of 2 months of intense shootouts and assasinations, the Pigs have yet to have a fatal casualty, further elevating their dangerous status. Aria has stated countless times how lucky she is to have such valuable assets.

They do not dabble in illegal activites, only as security personnel and local enforcers much to the dismay of the Council who so wishes to send a Spectre to bring them in, where their technology could be studied.

All, the same, the Illusive Man, has kept a close eye on their progress, though most of these strange advanced humans have gone into hiding and lying low, up to the point where they're almost untraceable but the War Pigs, ever a fan of explosions, bar fights and good ol' shootouts has kept the Illusive Man updated on their progress in the galaxy regularly for each mercenary job they accept.

100% success rate, only another team he knew of in the galaxy had that kind of success rate. Commander John Shepard.

* * *

><p>John Shepard, age 32, previously resurrected by Pro-Human extremist organisation known as only as Cerberus, rubbed the back of his neck, a tiring day, it had been, cutting through Eclipse mercenaries just to rescue then re-recruit Garrus Vakarian, or as he calls his vigilante self, Archangel.<p>

The Turian's skills had been honed on unfortunate mercs, where previously it was a number of Geth, and some mercs. Anyways, the shower had done it's job now, it's up to the well earned rest aboard the Normandy.

He set his head down, trying to drown out all his problems, the Reapers mostly, hell bent on killing everything organic, not that many people believed him, some accused him of being delusional when that Prothean beacon messed him up, even when the Geth and that Reaper, Sovereign, attacked the Citadel itself, the pompous asses of the Citadel Councilors still refuse to acknowledge it's existence and focus on the real threat when they've now taken to patrolling the Terminus System.

Like that's gonna stop the Reapers. And now, whole human colonies are emptied, not a single soul left, dead or alive, abducted by an enigmatic race known only as the Collectors, which resides somewhere beyond the Omega 4 Relay.

Threat after threat appearing, and Shepard is on a desperate race against time to not only unite the races against the Reapers but stop the Collectors from taking away more humans and if possible, free those enslaved.

However, things are looking bleak as ever, having relying on funding from a terrorist organisation can only go so far. By now, Shepard had fallen into a dreamless state of semi-consciousness, when there was a knock on his quarters' door. He sat up with a groan,

"Come in,"

He slurred. It Miranda Lawson, Cerberus' liason and the second in command of the Normandy, next to Commander Shepard. She stuck her head in, before speaking in her thick Australian accent,

"Commander, I apologise, but the Illusive man wishes to speak to you, he-"

Upon seeing Shepard dozing off, she raised her voice,

"Commander! Now, I've got your attention, head to Communications room."

The Illusive Man's transmission was already there when Shepard walked in,

"Shepard, you look worse for wear, then again, I'd like to apologise for interrupting your beauty sleep,"

The Illusive man's prosthetic eyes pierced Shepard's gaze as he spoke, sending a slight chill running down his spine.

"Don't worry about that, so, mind telling me, what you got?"

The Illusive Man leaned ever closer to the screen before speaking, his voice barely a whisper,

"Tell me, Shepard, have you ever heard of the War Pigs?

* * *

><p>Chapter redone.<p> 


	7. Chapter 6: A tale and a new job

2185 CE, 2255 hours...

Normandy SR-2, orbiting Omega...

2 months,2 days after First Contact...

* * *

><p>Shepard sagged his shoulders and scratched the back of his neck again, like back in his quarters, <em>damn itch!<em> he thought.

"To be honest, I've only been rebuilt less than a week ago, and now you're asking me a question I'm very alien to. So you tell me,"

The Cerberus leader blinked once, either startled at his sudden backlash, but continued all the same in calm and professional manner he had mantained since the founding of Cerberus.

"The War Pigs, are a new addition of mercs in the galaxy, 2 months ago, they appeared in Omega, just like that," to emphasis what he meant, the Illusive Man snapped his fingers,

"No history on them, nothing, just plain appeared in Omega, from what my agents gathered, they pack highly advance tech, advanced enough to be on par with the Collectors,"

That got Shepard interested, "Hmm, you got me, so...tell me more about these War Pigs," The screen was filled with snapshots, some in higher quality than the others, in the background the Illusive Man continued his explanation,

"To be honest, it's not just them, more and more of these were sighted all over the galaxy, however, in 2 months they've gone into hiding, untraceable, Citadel and Systems Alliance are using whatever resources they have to locate these guys, If humanity, were to gain access to these tech, mini-fusion reactor, power suits, we could jumpstart humanity another 100 years in technology and have a chance to go toe-to-toe with the Reapers, in terms of Infantry."

Shepard stared hard at the photo in front of him, trying to make out heads or tails, apparently the suits resembled 21st century space explorers, but heavily armored, no doubt someone would need one hell of a power supply to feed the suit juice.

"So where can I find these-"

"Like I said, Shepard, it's not that simple, everyone of these anomalies has gone underground somehow, I've got dealings with the Shadow Broker to help locate them, it's a matter of time so at the moment you start off with them, in just 2 months they've not only integrated well with the society on Omega but carved a bloody empire on their own, Blood Pack, Blue Suns, Eclipse, as tough as they are, steer clear away from the War Pigs, they currently are under Aria's contract as enforcers, Citadel wants to send a Spectre in to bring these guys in, we have to get to them first before whoever it is they send does. They live in the populated area, West of Afterlife, they call their place, Hell's Teeth, apt word for that, the surrounding buildings and windows, narrow alleyways give perfect opportunities for boxing anything into killzones, I want you to recruit them, all 31 of them, if you can."

The ressurected Commander crossed his hands, "31! my ship can't take that many people, another 31 people aboard would be too much for the Normandy, she's got a max number of at least 70 crewman, and we've already got close to 40!"

Illusive Man twirled the icy mysterious drink in his hands before continuing, "I said if you can, get all 31 of them you can take a squad o two, I'm willing to finance their price but you have to do the recruitment yourself."

There was silence as Shepard suddenly let fly another question,"When I went to Omega, for Garrus and Mordin Solus, why didn't you tell me about them?" The Illusive Man leaned out, "Simple, you had too much on your hands, further burdening you would not be constructive for us both."

The connection was cut, Shepard shuffled aimlessly back to his room, that comfy, cozy bed waitng for him.

"Get Garrus, Mordin and Taylor in the meeting room, 5 hours from now, I need a nap, can't start a meeting if I'm gonna be falling asleep every 5 minutes, I barely held on with the Illusive Man just now,"

Miranda merely nodded curtly before strutting off.

* * *

><p>2185 CE, 0325 hours...<p>

Normandy, orbiting Omega...

2 months,2 days after First Contact...

Shepard had to apologise to the team for being a minute late, Miranda had taken it upon herself to brief the team on current objectives, "need-to-know-basis" as she puts it, as Shepard took over, he picked up where the Cerberus Officer left off.

"...Frankly, I don't know much about their combat capabilities, strengths,_ weaknesses_ other than their history spent on Omega for the past 2 months. So, Garrus, during your time as Archangel, did you ever hear about them, maybe even exchanged fire?"

The Turian straightened himself, a cold game face on, "Yeah, I did. Once. All started when I overhead couple of Eclipse guards talking about losing one of their security their contract to some new Mercenary group known only as the War Pigs, of course since Eclipse lost something to a small time gang must surely mean it's bigger than it looks, I bribed my way to find these War Pigs, one of Aria's guards, whom I won't name, told me they were dealing with a couple of Vorcha gangers, not Blood Pack by the way, still, this sort of dealing just begs for a visit from Archangel, just as the guard told me, Vorcha, talking to some Humanoids, I didn't know they were humans at the time, helmets sealed shut and all, but their armor, really, really big, the kind that can take on a Krogan in a fist fight and walk out alive, not kidding, They exchanged something, I don't know what, I don't care why, I was about to take the shot on the War Pig's in charge when all of a sudden..."

Garrus gritted his teeth/mandibles in anger.

"All of a sudden i felt something circular and cold imprint itself on the back of my head, bastard, got the drop on me, I was careful enough, how the hell did they knew I was coming? course I manged to overthrow the guy that gotten the jump on me, but what I was up against, I wasn't ready to face, humanoid, black armor, skin tight, it's face was masked by this Tactical Helmet, scary lookin' too, some sort of long barreled rifle strapped on his back. He stepped back, fast, damn real fast when i swung at him, he did something unexpected, he disappeared, like stealth tech, or cloaking of some kind, but there was no generator on his body armor, just skin tight, I dunno, maybe it was something in the suit but I had no time to react, bastard came at me with a knife, I ducked, fell off my hiding place, the air around me was filled with gunfire, I managed to escape via underground tunnel. I'd definitely advise you to be on your guard, they're dangerous stuff I tell you."

Shepard nodded as he took in his squadmate cum old friend's recount, sure it just tells him how dicey these Pigs can be, the Salarian, somehow never heard of them, too busy taking care of the sick, however, was hitting it off making assumptions and theories behind the Pigs' technology. He spoke too fast for anyone to even understand, even for Miranda with her genetic enhancements. For Christ's sakes the man was spitting 200 words per minute, a joke, John and Taylor started.

With arrangements to go back to Omega were being made, Shepard stood up, therefore signalling the end of the meeting.

"We're going back to Omega, do what you have to do and meet me in the hangar for dust off in 10," he announced triumphantly, the Slarian, the ex-Alliance Corsair and the Cerberus Officer confirmed their orders before leaving the meeting room, the Turian stood at the doorway, craning his neck and sighed sarcastically, "And I thought we would finally leave this place,"

John could only pat his friend's armored shoulders as they both left the meeting room.

"Not yet Garrus, not yet."

The War Pigs were no longer as wet behind the ears as compared to when they first mysteriously appeared on Omega, they learnt the ways of the galaxy, don't piss off the Shadow Broker, don't piss off a Krogan Battlemaster, to survive on Omega, one must use a gun at least 3 times a day.

For the War Pigs, it was almost like 10 per day, considering their Merc jobs, under Aria alone, they've squashed several underground organisations that planned to usurp her, settled disputes between gangs before things got bloody and sometime escorted shipments of alcohol, Turian and human made alike as security officers. They've carved a large chunk of clients and cash from the big 3; the Blue Suns, Eclpse and the Blood Pack and managed to snatch hundreds of their deals and security contracts, and having a nice profit numbering in the tens of thousands every month.

From there, they would invest heavily in ammunition, private fridges with alcohol and food and companies specialising in synthesizing metals, of which were very few on Omega for none could sythesize neo-steel, too complex for them to understand when the galaxy back home, every Tom, Dick and Harry could synthesize neo-steel much less acquire it from Solonoid crystals.

Nevertheless the Pigs have yet to have their armors properly damaged and a fatal casualty on their side. The Ghost, Swash or Operative-409, has become more relaxed than he was before, and has taken the time to mingle with the War Pigs, Falks and Eddie was busy locked in the poker game representing Delta Squad, against Charlie and Alpha squads.

All of a sudden, his suit's communication device beeped, and the Mercenary had to excuse himself to take the call, it was Aria.

"Yeah, boss?...I see, yes ma'am, you have? What, why? sure, sure o..okay...okay..gotcha, I'll radio ya' back when it's done,"

'Diamond', the field tester for the kinetic barriers 2 months ago slapped his leader's massive shoulder plate.

"So, who was it? Asari stripper? Vorcha bum buddy? heheh?"

The others joining in, whooping and laughing. Falks cleared his throat, his face stern, and his game face screwed tight.

"Boys, Aria called, We got a new employer, goes by the name, Commander Shepard."

* * *

><p>Okay, this chapter is up and running, so, to those confused like 2 months, and Shepard's 1 week HE was resurrected a week ago, in this story, the War Pigs came here 2 months ago, in this story. And I hope I got Shepard's character well, using the Paragon male, Earthborn guy. Team has Jacob Taylor, Miranda Lawson, Garrus Vakarian and Mordin Solus, soon they're gonna get Grunt, Jack, ... anyways RnR, yeah?<p> 


	8. Chapter 7:Meetings

2185 CE, 0545 hours...

Omega, Hell's Teeth

2 months, 3 days after First Contact...

* * *

><p>There was an emergency meeting that very minute, held at the void deck. Mot of the War Pigs wanted answers they did Aria sell them out, to this John Shepard and from what the extranet said, he was an Alliance N7-Commando, first human Spectre and...was declared dead for almost 3 years.<p>

"I say this is bullshit, sarge, man was dead for 3 years, witnesses and shit, now, now, Aria's selling us over to him!"

It was Corporal Phil Carson, Alpha's marksman, usually silent and keeps to himself, until now that is, Sav stepped in to pipe him down.

"Settle down, Phil, we don't know all that, could be government conspiracy leaked to the net on purpose, even I don't know what the fuck's going on here, Boss, ya got anything to say bout' this?"

The others nodded in agreement, all turned to Falks who was discussing a topic with the Ghost, who by the way had his helmet off. Upon noticing the room was now silent, and that awkward feeling he was being watched, Falks paused, shooed the Ghost away before addressing the 30 strong mercenaries present.

"Alright, first things first, Pigs, Aria got contacted by this group all hush-hush known as Cerberus, which claims to represent as this Shepard's liason, we still get a chance to back out, but-"

Eddie's voice chipped in rudely, "Why now, boss? Aria's been good to us, fuck that, Omega's been good to us, why should we give this life up to working for some Government asshole, who's officially dead to the galaxy, shit runs deeper than this man, we're gonna be jump into a world of shit, way above our paygrade!"

More murmurings from the Pigs, the War Pigs had a history of bad blood with government so it wasn't surprising to see disgruntlement went give a chance to work for someone in the System Alliance. Falks waited until the questioning stops before resuming,

"Right, as I said, Aria has given us the choice of backing down, we can choose to NOT go, and live like kings here, or, we can head on with this doo-hicky and kick some righteous ass, Shepard's 15 minutes out from here, to recruit us, I-we don't know what's his angle, but we're allowed to come up with our own price, so, there's definitely big game here, whaddaya say, boys?"

Nodding amongst the ranks, a good sign. However, when one of the Pigs asked one more question, it was totally an unexpected one, "Do we get to bring booze along?"  
>igniting laughter from everyone, even the Ghost guffawed at least.<p>

Charlie and Bravo were assigned guard duty, to keep a lookout on the perimeter among the surrounding rooftops and apartments that were forcefully cleared out to avoid any civillian casualties.

Very important guests were coming, and wether they leave the place alive or in pieces depends on their reason for causing the War Pigs'...retrenchment from Aria T' Loak.

* * *

><p>30 minutes ago...<p>

2185 CE, 0507 hours...

Omega, Afterlife

2 months, 3 days after First Contact...

* * *

><p>The ramp unfolded and the Normandy SR-2 disgorged Shepard and his squad, Garrus and Miranda, Mordin had opted to stay behind and get himself proper with the lab.<p>

A familiar sight greeted them, it was the same loony Salarian that had welcomed them when Shepard, first came for Mordin Solus and Archangel/Garrus Vakarian.

"Hey, hey, y..you're back, haha, I was wondering when you'd return I-"

Garrus stepped in before Shepard could do anything.

"Listen here, we're here for business with Aria, so step aside and let us through unless you want to be caught dead with a hole the size of my fist in your face,"

The alien gulped, mumbled something before giving way, "O..of course, forgive me," The Commander sighed and shook his head, "That was kinda harsh but, he had it coming."

They made their way into Afterlife, past stares of drunks, perverts and Asari strippers, a Batarian guard stood firm at the bottom of the stairwell.

"Let me guess, you wanna talk to Aria? I'll radio ahead and tell her you're coming...Ok, proceed,"

Aria had finished her iced alcoholic drink by the time Shepard and his people arrived, she was so looking forward to enjoying her beverage and converse with Shepard at the same time.

"Took you long enough," Shepard smiled cynically causing the Asari to scowl, "Fine, pleasantries aside, what business do you have here, I thought you were done when you came for Mordin and Archangel?"

And exchange of words took place, of which the contents will remain private between Aria, her guards, Shepard and his squad. During said conversation, Aria was unwilling to give up an asset that had further clamp her grip over Omega, not to mention she had invested much on them.

Nevertheless, she relented after Cerberus offered to pay her 2 Billion credits, half the price it took to bring Shepard back from the dead. The deed was done with a handshake, all that was left was for Aria to ping her ex-employees. Franklin Toretto doesn't sound very happy over the brief exchange but, he took it rather well, Aria bid the guests good luck as they left for Hell's Teeth.

"I was on that ledge there, right when i got ambushed,"

Said Garrus as he pointed to a rusty looking building, the others with him nodded and kept an eye out, they were not far from their destination, a few more turns and bends to go, but it was getting creepier and darker by the minute.

It was past midday yet the sun and neon lights were getting darker and darker, as if blocked by the buildings. Worst of all, they all had the feeling they were being watched, how true they were, for atop one of the run-down buildings were a couple of heavy suited mercenaries, their Navy blue coloring melting the outlines of their power armor nicely with the shadows. One of them opened communications by blink-clicking his HUD.

"Overlord actual, this is Alpha-1-1, eyes on target over, next plan of action, how copy?"

Not a second later, someone replied, "Copy that, 1-1 continue reconnaissance of targets and make sure they don't get lost, reveal yourselves only if they have to, over."

"This is the place, you'd think anyone would wanna live here, its so...quiet, to think such a place exists on Omega," mumbled Shepard, earning the occasional 'Hmph' from Miranda, they continued advancing, weapons drawn but shouldered casually, all of a sudden there was a grunt, "Shepard!"

John quickly turned around and came was staring down a black humanoid...thing holding the former C-Sec at gunpoint with a sniper rifle of some sort.

Miranda moved in, ready to fire when dozens of laser sights lit up the darkness like the neon lights in Afterlife, flashed and marked onto the three.

"Ah' wouldn't do that missy," the voice sounded as though someone spoke through an external source, a speaker of some sort as it sounded amplified.

Something moved from the shadows, causing Shepard to raise his custom modded M-8 Avenger, "Whoa, whoa stand down people, I'm Commander Shepard, your former boss sent me...you know? Aria? ring any bells?" There was silence, for a few seconds, the atmosphere becomming hostile by the minute. All of a sudden dozens of armored forms, emerged from their hiding places, the suits they wore was HUGE, as tall as a Krogan, as armored as Krogan but definitely meaner and definitely scarier.

One of them raised the helmet revealing a human face, somewhere between the age of 20-30, he had a cigar in his mouth, puffing away cheerfully. 'These guys are War Pigs? They're more like rednecks in space!' thought Shepard.

Miranda glanced at Shepard, Shepard glanced back before nodding. She lowered and holstered her pistol with a sigh.

"Yeah, buddy, Aria told us you were coming, she also mentioned you're supposed to be dead for 3 years unless it's all hush-hush government BS,"

"It's a bit more complicated than that," replied Shepard.

With a shrug, and a whine of servos, the leader motioned Shepard to follow, the...thing that had Garrus captive disappeared before Shepard's eyes causing him to furrow his eyebrow, Miranda nodded to herself, excited about learning what other advanced technology they had in store.

Garrus rubbed his temple, where the Ghost had pushed the barrel on, swearing in his tongue as he did so. Shepard was holstering his weapons to his suit when the same guy that addressed them called out.

"This way, hurry up, our Boss is waiting on you, don't try anything funny or me and my boys will fill you with so much steel, yall' can run scrap stations of your own,"

Not a word was said as the Shepard and his squad followed this other armored forms accompanied them from behind, ready to scrap Shepard and his squad at the first sign of trouble. Shepard didn't like it anymore than his squadmates does, entering hostile territory, led by strangers, much less to the galaxy, who knows what kind of danger awaits in Hell's Teeth?

'We're on the highway to hell now,' he thought.

* * *

><p>There, done, RnR plz<p> 


	9. Chapter 8 part 1:New Players

2185 CE, 0527 hours...

Omega, Hell's Teeth

2 months, 3 days after First Contact...

* * *

><p>The threesome were led further in, until they came facing a door, it opened and one of the armored forms gestured Shepard to enter. Inside, were more figures, human and not in power armor, they casually went about their business, playing cards, smoking, drinking, some of them watching pornography on their Omni-tools and would sometimes sneak a peek at Shepard and his squad.<p>

"Right down there, turn left," sniffed the armored form to Shepard's right.

They followed the directions and it led them to a small room in the building, inside was one of the armored figures sitting on a table, legs on top it and puffing happily away on his cigar. The table creaked as the huge bulk of a man shifted his legs about. For a while, the man did nothing, feeling annoyed Shepard faked a cough and that got his attention, the War Pig cursed and quickly flicked the cigar away before sitting properly.

"Shit, sorry bout' that, them Earth-done ciggies real good, ya' know?"

Garrus this time faked a cough and rubbed his cheek, a polite way of saying, 'WHATEVER CAN WE PLEASE GET A MOVE ON?' As if reading Garrus's mind, the figure sitting on the chair asked, his voice gravelly and thick in southern American accent like all the other armored forms were.

"So,"

Focusing his gaze on Shepard, "Commander Shepard, what can I and my boys do fer ya'?" Shepard cut to the chase, skipping introductions on behalf of Cerberus, much to XO Lawson's dismay and gave him the rundown; mysterious alien race that lives somewhere in uncharted space only known as the Collectors are abducting Colonies. Human colonies.

And no distress call,wierd part is when reinforcements arrive and scour the Colonies that had gone dark, no sign of a fight or struggle could be found, not even a single body and despite collaboration between Alliance Intelligence and Citadel Spectres, they're not doing that much due to politics.

Now, he's being funded by Cerberus, a terrorist organisation, further adding to her anguish as she had wanted to describe Cerberus as a covert human-welfare group. Their mission was to stop more colonies from being raided by finding their homebase, birthworld, or anything that had Collectors dwelling in and from there, mount a rescue mission.

He also began explaining about the Reapers, sentient, massive ships that resemble giant squids from Earth's deep oceans, would exterminate all life every 50,000 years in an unbreakable cycle. The abduction of humans and Reapers are somehow connected as Collectors, an enigma to the galaxy, kept to themselves and began operations on human colonies shortly after Shepard's death and the conclusion to the-

"Whoa backup, your death? so, you really died?" Falks craned his neck in disbelief, "Then how are you-" Miranda cut in, "Our organisation...acquired Shepard's body and began rebuilding his broken body, what you see, is a rather...unfinished product, sadly."

'Wow, tech that can bring people back from the dead, must be science fiction gone nuts and lotta cash involved too,' thought Falks as he shook his head, "So, you need our help on going on some suicide mssions in stopping these motherfuckers from gettin' more people, who in accordance to ya' are related to huge mechanical aliens that kill everything breathing, eating, and shitting every fucking 50,000 years?"

Falks shifted his neo-steel plated shoulders, that's alot of info to take in, and here he thought, the universe wasn't so bad out here. Shepard leaned nearer, his arms akimbo, "Will you help us? I should tell you there's no guarantee you'd survive-"

"I'm in,"

"What?"

Asked the Commander, "I-We're in, us War Pigs are all about beers, guns, and good ol' suicide missions, course fee's ain't cheap, you do know we charge 300000 creds per month right?"

Garrus nearly fell off his chair at the mention of the cost.

"300000 creds! This is robbery in broad daylight, is it?" facing Miranda, who nodded, satisfied he got the human quote right, he pursued, "This much money can hire Blue Suns and Eclpse for at least a decade!" The Cerberus officer however, was unfazed by the expensive cost of said mercenary group.

"Deal, Cerberus is willing to pay 500000, per month, as long you abide by Commander Shepard's rules aboard the Normandy and not jeapordise the mission."

Falks lit a cigar and puffed, nodding in agreement at the same time, He shifted over to his new employer, squinted his eyes before asking, "And, what are your rules, my good man?"

They were simple enough to abide by, take orders from Shepard, no fights on the ship, obviously, and no gun-toting when not in combat-zones, accidents cost lives as they say, Shepard had agreed to wait for about an hour as Falks gathered a handpicked squad, the Ghost comes along, Falks thinks he would make a fine addition to Shepard's squad and his psionic abilities make him invaluable, and he now has a proper superior to answer to, servos began whining, booted feet stamping about and men rushed to their respectives custom-made Combat suits.

Shepard watched in fascination as one fellow War Pig, strapped himself and a wierd machine stuck pieces of the suit together, Miranda meanwhile had gone off, somewhere private to report findings of the War Pigs and success in recruiting them to the Illusive Man.

Garrus had taken himself to a lonely corner, away from prying eyes, he was rather worried should somehow one of the War Pigs discover his second identity, Archangel. Shepard was discussing something with one of the Pigs, judging by him pointing out at their suits, then jabbing over to their large chemical propellent weapons, he was inquiring on their unknown technology.

Shepard was on the point of detonating in nuclear fury, he was now the Commander of the War Pigs, and as good employees they should at least share their massive technological advancements that is Powered Suits, but their IC, Franklin Toretto or Falks refused to even give one sample.

The Reapers are coming to exterminate everything and their only rebuttal is, "Sorry, man, but yall' gotta make yer' own shit, if you keep borrowing stuff from others you'll never gonna make an original, relying on the element zero too much is bad enough,"

To cool himself down, he went over to their kitchen as or the closest thing there was to a kitchen; a converted living room filled with fridges. Down to the left he saw most of the War Pigs standing around Falks and being handpicked into the team to tag along with Shepard, he spied an what looks like an unfinished power pack that's located at the back of the Pigs' suit, swerving his head right and left, making sure only he was not being watched, satisfied he wasn't, yet, he strided over to the power pack.

Mordin would love to get a a go on this, he thought at the possibility if Mordin could actually replicate or better, create a newer and better version and ready for mass produce, it would opn up doors to power suits, walker mechs and more.

"'Scuse me sir,"

one of the War Pigs gently moved Shepard out of the way with one massive hand, Shepard could only watch as he tinkered around with the little scrap metal, finally, it thrummed to life. "Yes, done it!" exclaimed the techie and he began latching the pack onto the back of his suit. Miranda tapped him on the shoulder, "I've sent my report and the War Pigs have assembled the team, now, they're moving some of their belongings aboard. By the way, Commander, where's Garrus?"

Shepard looked around. Good question, where the hell is he?

'Low profile, come on, act normal, c'mon old man, pull yourself together,'

Grunted Garrus Vakarian silently as he tried to cling on to some hidden corner, putting a lot of effort to stay out of sight, his growing concern about his identity being at risk had developed into full blown paranoia, his eyepiece flooding him unnecessary information and the fact that it displayed abnormal Turian heart rate was NOT helping the situation at all.

That's it! he screamed silently, enough of fear getting the best of him, he's former C-sec, former Archangel, the angel of death, and he was not gonna' break down, ever.

He's going to calmly, confidently walk to the exit and- something tapped him on the right shoulder, he stole a glance and saw a slender black gloved hand on it, 'oh fuck, not you,'

Garrus put on his best Turian version of a smile and turned around, "So, you're the new addition to the team?" the figure who was tall, slender for a human male and dressed in deep black skin-suit with a creepy looking facemask strapped to his face, nodded. silent-type, hmm, maybe there won't be any trouble after all, assuming he doesn't start asking questions on my background.

"2nd Lieutenant Nijax Swash, Ghost Operative-233761, or just Lieutenant Swash, if you wish"

Garrus gave the Turian version of a frown, "That is quite a mouthful, Lieutenant...Swash,"

Without a word, the Ghost cloaked in front of him, startling him slightly, that needs some getting used to, just as Garrus was about to go back to all "Low Profile" Swash's voice echoed from all directions, and what he said haunted the Turian for many nights. "See you around. Archangel."

He knew! He fucking knew! Holy shit! okay, okay, calm down, he hasn't ratted you out yet, but what if the other War Pigs knew? then-

"Garrus! There you are!"

A different voice this time, causing him to nearly die of shock, he angrily growled at the owner of said voice.

"Spirits! Commander, don't go sneaking up on me like that, sheesh, like one surprise is bad enough."

Shepard broke into a huge grin before beckoning him to follow, "Come on, lets go, Falks and his squad, and what's wating you? seen a Ghost or something?"

Garrus sighed and followed Shepard a lot on his mind, maybe he would get to the bottom of how his second identity was compromised aboard the Normandy, as Turian and Human walked past dozens of armored humanoids some carrying different items than the others, the Turian replied to what his human friend had said. Very softly, so soft that only he alone can hear it.

"Something like that,"

* * *

><p>OMG SOOOO sorry i was late, chapter finally redone. RnR :D<p> 


	10. Chapter 8 Part 2:A new mission already?

**_2185 CE, 23:42 hours_**

**_Crew Deck, Normandy SR-2_**

**_ Omega, low orbit_**

**_2 months, 3 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>Falks carried his personal items packed neatly in a crude metal box, the Normandy gave a rather bad impression at first, small on the outside but surprisingly spacious on the inside, not to mention ergenomics that would put Mengsk's extravagant throne to shame.<p>

Bunk-22, Crew Deck-02. This is the place, thought the Mercenary as he slid his armored hand onto the scanner but somehow his DNA could not be read due to the thickness of the CMC-400, and so in anger, he flipped the birdie with a frown plastered on his face.

Luckily though, the door opened, someone from the inside had done sop; it was that Cerberus woman that had tagged along with Commander Shepard. She was rather startled when seeing Falks in intimidating armor towering in front of her as if, she was caught with her hand in a cookie jar, she curtly nodded then nimbly pushed her way past him, avoiding eye contact all the while.

"Strange girl, she is,"

With a little bit of effort, Falks managed to slip his combat gloves off and cleared the scanner, his bunk was small but enough to share with another War Pig, Nelson Deveraux, part of the team Falks had assemble to aid this Shepard. The first thing Falks did was to unpack his personal belongings, some clothes he bought from Omega, few boxes of Cuban Cigars from Earth, a picture of his wife and the kids, taken back in '49. He dotingly traced his armored finger over his wife's cheeks in the picture.

He then set them all in the appropriate places. A while later, he was out of his Combat Suit and taking a stroll around the ship, trying to familiarise himself with the narrow walkways and rooms. The Normandy didn't really pack much military hardware other than some dropships, and an IFV he saw once during one of his mercenary jobs, hostiles had somehow gotten their hands on one of them, Mako as its called, the Ghost had taken it out by simply bewitching the crew to blow each other's brains out before the sole survivor slit his own throat, shell-shocked by the madness that had ensued inside the Mako.

As he headed someplace else, the other War Pigs were already hitting the showers the Normandy provided, back on Hell's teeth, water sometimes ran out and they had to send some poor bastard to unclog whatever it is that's clogging the filter, in the meantime they rationed water and used it for basic purposes. Now, with water being in abundance, he could now freely slam the tap on full throttle without the fear of his bath cut short.

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 23:47 hours<em>**

**_Normandy SR-2, low orbit_**

**_2 months, 3 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>Shepard was watching in amusement as War Pigs brought crates of unknown items back and forth into the mess hall, and each time they returned to the mess hall, Sergeant Gardner would yell at them incoherently. He stopped one of the Pigs,<p>

"Hey, hold up a second,"

The mercenary towered above Shepard and flipped his reflective gold visor up, revealing a tight-jawed african-american puffing away on a cigar, suddenly the idea stopping the Pig and asking him sounded like the stupidest idea ever, aside from saving the Council during the siege of the Citadel. To his surprise, the monster of a man cracked a friendly grin, "Yes, sah' what can Ah' do for you?"

'Seriously what is up with these hillibilly accents?' thought Shepard, "Ahem, not to be rude or anything but what is that you're bringing in? And why is Gardner so pissed about it?"

Without a word, the merc pulled the lid off the crate, inside were several bottles of beer lying in neat rows of threes.

"Tis' ah' going away gift from the boys, not everyday you get hired for a save-the-galaxy kind of thing, course I'm not part of your team, only helping movin' stuff but, I sure wished I could,"

They walked and talked about issues not related to the Reapers or the Collectors, no, this time it was good ol' football, God how Shepard missed these kind of conversations instead of always going "Oh Reapers, this," and, "Collectors that,"They chatted with enthusiasm on their favourite teams, for about half an hour before Joker beeped Shepard over intercom the Normandy is ready to go. The Pig who had been talking with Shepard, PFC Mickey Foo had shown himself to the ramp where the other War Pigs that didn't tag along were waiting on him Shepard did a quick salute towards the armored forms as the loading ramp clamped shut and the Normandy headed for orbit.

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 2348 hours<em>**

**_Miranda's quarters, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Omega, low orbit_**

**_2 months, 3 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>Miranda Lawson jumped onto her bed, it had been 3 days since she had a good night sleep, or was it 5? Most of her time she was spent filing in administrative issues, handing personal and routine reports to the Illusive Man and not to mention running and gunning around the galaxy with Shepard, hot on the trail of the Collectors.<p>

Now, she had a whole week to herself since she had completed her latest assignment; plant listening devices and mini cameras at every room the Pigs had bunked in. She couldn't sleep yet, still shell-shocked that her cover was almost blown. Her personal computer beeped and the Cerberus Operative moaned in discomfort. The Illusive Man had given her another assignment,_ great, more sleepless nights._

She sat up slowly on her bed, activated her omni-tool and navigated to her chrono; 2348 hours. _Well, the Illusive Man can wait, I'll look into this tomorrow, _and Miranda went back to lying on her bed.

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 23:48 hours<em>**

**_Medical Wing, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Omega, low orbit_**

**_2 months, 3 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>Down in the medical ward, Mordin was assisting Doctor Chakwas giving the War Pigs a medical checkup, she insisted so as months living in the underworld of Omega may in fact cause diseases of which the Mercenaries may have contracted unknowingly. "...Alright, you're clear, next!"<p>

The War Pig dressed in singlet and shorts with an electronic dog tag slung around his neck came forward, "Right, hold still sir," a beam of orange light sprang forth from her Omni-Tool and Chakwas began her scan on the tough muscular form before her. Mordin had taken time to examine the suits they left outside her ward.

"Fascinating, fusion reactor also may run on waste materials, disgusting to certain extent but reliable, *raps on the chest piece* Sturdy and no doubt heavy, made of unknown alloys, Omni-Tool has no match, could be from where they came, yes, hmm would like to do more research on power armor, ah, Kinetic Barrier generator, custom upgrade, very adaptive suits, Omni-Tool as well, human tech, always fascinating wherever may be."

The last of the War Pigs emerged from the medical ward, and apparently he was the operator of the power armor Mordin was examining, "Got everything you need, doc?" the Salarian shook his head, "Learned much but not that much, must do more research, yes, such as-" The merc entered the CMC-400 suit, as he was fiddling with the damn locks and straps he conversed with Mordin, "Well, doc, I ain't got that much load on me at the moment, so, i guess we could do your research thing, but, don't tell Falks, he don't like sharing tech with yall'," The Salarian nodded and made his way to the Science Lab, _his, _science lab. With the War Pig tailing him.

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 00:12 hours<em>**

**_Mess Hall, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Omega, low orbit_**

**_2 months, 4 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>With the War Pigs around, the Mess hall lived up to it's name, a mess, but Sergeant Gardner didn't mind, he let it slide, hell, they've created a whole new atmosphere in the usually silent area, almost like a pub, with the alcoholic drinks spilt every now and then, and the constant singing of drunk merry men in powered armor, and crowds of people exchanging money, grim smiles on their faces.<p>

Shepard entered the mess hall just in time to see Gardner and a bunch of the Pigs wiping up the tables and chairs, "What the hell happened here," he asked, mouth almost agape at what has become of his beloved mess hall, Gardner did a quick salute, before answering, "Crazy Pigs that's what happened sir,"

The other War Pigs were fooling around with their mops and buckets and cloths, apparently acting out a parody of a play, dated early 17th century.

"Hey, quit playing around kiddies, and clean this shit up!"

Yelled Gardner across the din, the mercenaries immediately stood up to full height in attention before carrying out Gardner's orders, Shepard only shook his head, he still had to know where they came from, and he intended to after he had a bite of disgusting nutrient pastes that the Cerberus ship had a large stockpile of. After gulping down the unsavory morsel, the Commander headed to the exit, he remebered something and turned, facing Gardner, "Mess Sergeant, when they're done with your chores, tell them to head up to the Conference Room, got a new recruit to add," The aging mess hall owner replied back, raising his voice so he could be heard, "Will do, Commander!"

Garrus was the first to arrive, well, if you're not counting the Commander himself, his armor scarred and blackened by constant gunfights against crime lords and mercenaries, Mordin, Jacob and Miranda came in at the same time, and lastly were the War Pigs, "Now, that you're all here, lets get down to- wait, where's the other one? the..the...Ghost?" as soon as Shepard mentioned Ghost, the enigmatic psionic assasin winked into existence, standing at a corner, "I'm here," he rasped, causing Shepard to jolt in surprise. Jacob tried his best not to laugh at the Commander's reaction, Miranda and Garrus shook her head, the Pigs were, well, laughing their asses off, their armored fists banging on their thighs.

"That's very funny guys, now, We got another recruit, Illusive Man provided details, goes by the name, Jack, or her code name, Subject Zero and currently, said person is aboard the prison ship, Purgatory. Cerberus has paid for Jack's release and all we gotta do is collect her personally. Illusive Man hasn't provided me much background information, sadly. Purgatory is run by Blue Suns, I don't like this as much as you, things may get dicey but, we're there for Jack, and Jack only, simple extraction, nobody fires unless I say so, you get me?" "Yes Commander," "Affirmative," "Aye-aye Cap'n." and other forms of acknowledgement. "Good, Garrus, Miranda, Swash, with me, Falks, you break off a fireteam, lead by you and meet me in the hangar in 15 minutes, any questions?...no? Break."

* * *

><p><strong><em>Yay, chapter 8 part 2, redone, only chapter 9 and 10.<em>**


	11. Chapter 9: Biotic, meet Psionic

In the deep dark recess of the Osun System, there lay the prison ship, Purgatory. housing thousands of inmates, whose reputation so notorious and so ruthless not even their own homeworld would dare imprison them. So there they were sent, kept in tight lockdown for the rest of their lives, under constant watchful eye of the guards 24/7. Batarians, Humans, Turians, Krogans, you name it, they have it. and some tens of kilometres away, the stealth Frigate, christened the_ Normandy SR-2_, speeding towards the prison barge.

Commander Shepard was sent to seek an inmate out, and seek the inmate he did. His team was prepped and ready, and so were the auxillary team, the humans or Terrans as they preferred to call themselves, from an unknown region of space. He did not trust them yet, but time may tell where their allegience lie. His new squad member, Lieutenant Swash, or as the Pigs would call him, Ghost, slid the helmet over his face and tugged at his combat knife, doublechecking it was secure. They had T-20 minutes before contact with the Purgatory, so Shepard started the conversation, the wide hangar bay seemed to echo his words as he faced Master Sergeant Franklin Toretto.

"So...we're gonna need to build this trust thing sooner or later, and I'd like to do it now, lwts start with the basics, where are you from exactly?"

The War Pigs tensed and looked at one another, Falks, with a sigh slid his reflective visor,

"Well, boys, we knew this day was gonna come, alright, but, where we're from, it's not a pretty place to be in, at the moment."

The others present craned their necks, curious and confused by what the mercenary meant.

"Your Earth is run by them HSA, Alliance guys, ours...well, they're run by the United Earth Governement,"

That got the others quite a bit of a shock, sure they were not from this galaxy, but what they're suggesting is they're from,

"Another dimension?" Voiced Miranda out from the back. Falks shrugged,

"Maybe, Ah' don't really know much, never got ta' finish school, 2 months here, damn place makes no difference, I can tell a bit of our heritage and whatnot. I remember some history lessons from my middle school back on Tarsonis,"

The other War Pigs this time were startled at their IC's relevations, "Shit, boss, you was from Tarsonis, dayum, you must've been rolling in them dough. And why you ain't neva' tellin' us?"

Falks shrugged again, Shepard had never heard of this Tarsonis, but judging from Franklin's subordinate's reactions, he concluded Tarsonis must've been those kind of capital worlds where only the rich and powerful of society lived.

"Ok, so, here's a bit of the craziness starts, during the 22nd Century-" Garrus leaned in, "Um, not to sound rude but maybe you're mistaken, the humans here refer to this time and age as the 22nd Century,"

Falks grunted, annoyed but continued nontheless,"Well, Mister Vakarian, not to sound rude, but we're from the early 26th Century, twenty-five-oh-two."

More astonished faces and gasps of disbelief.

"Them UEG guys packed up our ancestors into these huge colony ships, they were criminals, mostly, some religious crazies here and there, Political opponents, ya' name it, so, they were loaded into 4 big colony ships, and sent em' flying away, many many lightyears, if I'm not mistaken from Earth."

Shepard asked, this time trying to quell the need for answers badly,

"Wait, wait, wait, your ancestors were dissidents, and the government sent every last one of them thrown to some godforsaken place, and they used the situation as part of a colonisation experimment?"

Falks, scratched the stubble of his chin with his armored hand,

"Hmm, I'm not sure, was never good in school, only miltary school, so, as I was saying. They crashed landed, on Moria, Tarsonis, my homeworld, and Umoja, the 4th one crashed though, damn shame all hands lost when they did. But the plan worked for them Earth boys, in a way, our ancestors however got cut off from Earth, so tried establishing their own governments, that's when we called ourselves Terrans, problem was, Koprulu Sector, the godforsaken place we were stuck in, had very little resource, either you had it and became filthy rich or you ain't got no valuable resources and ya' spent ya whole life either in the Corps or some whack job dirt farmer for the rest of ya life, and the next generation will endure, same after the other, we became nomads, foraging sollonoid crystals and vespene gas, an alternative to metal and fuel by the way. So, Tarsonis was ruled by the Confederacy Of Man, founded by powerful guys known only as the Old Families, powerful and mighty...tyrannical, course the Morians and Umojans got themselves governemnts and us 3 been hostile to each other ever since, some wars here and there, mix around black ops shit going on and rebellions,ya know? course flash forward tah' the 2490s and we got ourselves first contact with aliens, known as Protoss. Scary sum bitches Ah tell ya, bigger than Krogans, don't give me that look, it's true, they're ten feet tall, implanted with cybernetics and shit, making them move fast. Real. Fuckin'. Fast. they got shields that make ya' latest Kinetic Barriers ancient, and most of their army are...well, robotic, AI controlled,"

Some of the passengers were unnerved at what the Pig unveiled before them, that another race were not only highly advanced yet they used AI extensively without fear of an uprising such that the Quarians had which led to the Morning War and their deportation from their homeworld, there are however, others, such as Miranda who are intrigued by these enigmatic Protoss, shame they weren't sucked into this...universe, reverse enginnering their tech could have given Humanity a jumpstart another 2-3 centuries, and put itself on the pinnacle of the galaxy's superpower.

"First contact was Chau Sara, a Fringe Wolrd, or Outer Colony as you would say it, they burned it to the ground, all hands on the colony lost. But strangely, they warped out before our boys could have a go with them Xenos,"

Garrus clicked his mandible in anguish, "Just like that? They slaughtered innocents with orbital bombardment, no call for parlay, or...anything?"

All the War Pigs nodded, unnerving Shepard who found it kind of creepy.

"Yeah, Mar Sara was the sister world of Chau Sara, so, them being closest to Chau Sara, they got their panties in a bunch and got every swinging dick into the Colonial Militia, us War Pigs were at the time Confederate Black Ops, second only to the Ghosts, my squad was tasked to deliver a strike package, Apocalypse Class Nukes to an uncharted backwater planet thought to be under Protoss control, them high yield bombs would crack the planet open and giv' em a message, "Greetings Motherfucker, here's from us Terrans to you,"

Shepard pressed on about their mission objective, "Nukes, you used nukes? you people high or something using WMDs on unknown vectors, much less on another species! That's the same as committing genocide!"

Falks could only grin, "Hmph, at that time we couldn't give a rat's ass if we exterminated them, they were a threat to us, the moment they burned Chau Sara without so much as opening communications, and besides, we've been using-" There was a bump, the entire ship shook as the docking tubes from the Purgatory connected with Normandy.

Joker pinged shipwide over the intercom, "Docking tubes prepped and ready Commander," The teams gathered their weapons and gear, Shepard and the surrounding crewman were still craving to hear more of the mercenary's tale, but it had to wait, at least till they secured Jack safely onboard.

"That's quite a story there, I'll look forward to hearing more after this extraction," Falks nodded towards the ramp which was opening, "Sure, c'mon Commander lesgo' this Jack ain't gonna extract herself."

The interior of the Purgatory screamed of bleak in the walls, as had all the other prison barges Shepard had seen on the extranet, but at least this one was clean and tidy, to the point where he could declare the ship sterile. A few Blue Suns on guard duty would stare at Shepard and exchange glances, sometimes shift their gaze over to his team and Falks' The armored forms known as the War Pigs sent chills running down their spines, many of their mercenary brothers had fallen prey to the Pigs' devastating Terran Gauss weaponry, a few Suns had even trained their rifles onto each Pig and everyone else on their side, ready to drop them should the situation turn awry.

Shepard gripped his M-8 Avenger tightly, even though he looked calm and collected on the outside, his instincts were screaming and rattling at him to take cover and cut the surrounding Blue Suns down_..in...out...in...out...okay, okay steady, steady, deep . _breaths._..i'm fine...whoo..._ someone or something tapped his shoulder causing his anxiety to return and he felt himself stiffen for but a short while, it was the Ghost, Lieitenant Nijax Swash, new guy, "Commander, are you alright?"

John cleared his throat before shaking his head casually, "I'm fine Swash, thanks for the concern,"

He stole glances on Falks, his team and him on low alert, occasionally would look around, studying the interior like he and his team was. Garrus and Miranda were at the front, so they didn't know what was going on. Shepard resumed walking, the thrum of electronics and engines running, compounded by the loud stomping of boots, the whirring of hydraulic servos and humming of a power supply was almost getting to his head. There was a checkpoint there, and a lone Turian Blue Sun on manning the checkpoint.

Score one came to the guard that spoke to Shepard, if he was surprised that he was conversing with a supposedly dead person, he sure as hell wasn't showing it.

"Welcome to the Purgatory Shepard, your package is being prepped and you can claim it shortly, as this is a high security vessel, I'll have to ask you to relinquish your weapons as per standard security protocol,"

The Commander stood his ground, "Not gonna happen," The Turian mercenary in turn, stood firm to protocol, "Purgatory is more than secure and well defended against any form of breakout plus hundreds of contingencies, we-" "Everyone stand down!" all eyes fell upon another Turian who donned a similar set of Blue Suns Armor, he was unarmed at the moment, the pistol on his holster sitting beside his thigh comfortably, he walked down the steps and addressed Shepard and his...compatriots,

"Commander, I am Warden Kuril and I run the Purgatory, I ask that you relinquish your weapons as per standard procedure, we will return them to you once the transaction is complete, my, my, my, what have we here? War Pigs? heard all about you from the various platoons, those descriptions they gave sure aren't lacking,"

Falks snapped his visor open, a heartwarming smile plastered on his face, "Pleasure to meet you, Mister Kuril, Franklin Toretto, 3rd War Pigs Division." They shook hands before Shepard stepped in between them, "I hate to break this lovely conversation but didn't we came here for something else other than just a chat?"

Kuril nodded his head, "Yes, of course, Commander, follow me," The guard in question wanted quickly raised his objection,

"But sir,-".

"Let them proceed, our facility is more than secure to handle 7 armed guests. As we speak Jack is being brought out of cryo, as soon as the funds clear, you can be on your way. If you'll follow me to the pickup Commander."

Shepard nodded his head towards the door, "Right let's go, team, stay close." As they passed through the door they were greeted with the shifting of gears from machinery, the cursing and screaming of the inmates and the other guards respectively. A few Turian Suns rushed past them from behind mumbling something about a situation in Cell block 6. The warden Kuril turned and addressed Shepard once again, "Cell block 2, as you can see, we keep a tight control over the population." A few War Pigs shifted uncomfortably with their Impalers, one of them pinged Shepard,

"Ma'am, can we make this quick, Mike here's getting mighty uncomfortable with this place, says it reminds him of New Folsom too much," John wondered for a moment what New Folsom was, but dismissed it quickly, answers can come later, "Hold fast trooper, we'll be outta here shortly once we have Jack try to clam him down a little,"

"Aye, Commander."

Shepard then resumed conversing with Warden Kuril, he had quite a shock when ice filled her gut when the warden disclosed to her both unashamed and proudly that the prisoners would be sent back home at an unspecified time and place should the respective government fail to or refuse to transfer the monthly fee on time. As Miranda had stated, outright extortion, but the Turian didn't really care retorting that his methods may be considered extreme by some but his motives are pure. Questions flew forward from the Commander that is until they reached a junction where Kuril had to excuse himself to confirm the transaction from Cerberus, though more likely he just wanted to get away from Shepard's questions, they headed down a corridor to Outprocessing past, the interrogations room and the supermax wing, on the way there, they had to ignore the heartwrenching cries and pleas of the desperate and pitiful prisoners, until finally they reached the supermax wing, inside, were a row of benches and a lone technician accessing a terminal, without so much as stealing a glance, the techie pointed out where outprocessing was, Falks gave his thanks before joining Shepard.

"Here it is, now lets just-" When Shepard opened the cell supposedly to conatain Jack, it was empty,

"Eh, what the fuck?" one of the Pigs exclaimed in anguish, "Took the words right out of mouth," smirked Garrus.

The intercom buzzed, "My apologies Shepard, you're more valuable to me as a prisoner than a customer, drop your opens and proceed into this open cell. You will not be harmed." The other War Pigs, took this betrayal too serious, "Fuck no!" spat one, and other curses, Falks too was yelling explicit contents at Kuril and his mother, Garrus steadied his rifle and watched in amusement at the Pig's shenanigans, Miranda gave a soft_ hmph! _as if expecting this to happen, John Shepard flicked the safety of his Avenger,

"You don't wanna go down this road, Kuril," no need to turn this whole thing into a gigantic Turkey shoot, as far as he was concerned, the only targets to him were the Collectors and the Reapers.

"Activate systems!" growled Kuril and all hell broke lose. A squad of Blue Suns guard rushed in from the only entrance of the supermax wing, only to be cut down by the heavy gauss weaponry the mercenaries wielded, hostile kinetic barriers simply ceased to exist as the custom hollow point depleted uranium spikes ripped, punched and shattered through the barriers, armor and flesh and the fallen fell with bloodcurdling screams,

"Damn, that's brutal," mumbled Garrus as a poor Batarian Blue Sun sawed in messy pieces by a War Pig, Miranda kept herself at the back of the fight, observing the Pigs in action, they kept bantering with each other back and forth, which was amusing at best yet they put up a good fight, a stray round impacted on her shoulder, luckily her shields absorbed the mass accelerated metal, cursing under her breath, she sprayed with her Tempest SMG, forcing more Suns that had entered the fray to dive for cover. Shepard rolled the cooked grenade under the bench, 3 Blue Suns who were using it as cover had no time to get clear and were flung to the walls with shrapnel embedded in them, his HUD marked a Sun picking him as a target, he swing his Avenger around for a shot but as fate played a cruel joke on him, it needed a new thermal clip.

"Die!"

screamed the guard as he squeezed the trigger, a gunshot followed and said guard exploded in blood, bone and gore, Shepard cringed slightly before thanking Garrus,

"What? wasn't me!" he replied above the din as he slapped a new clip into his Mantis Sniper Rifle.

"Target down," rasped the Ghost beside him, Shepard nodded before neutralizing more hostiles. When finally the last guard fell, the team broke out of cover and hurried to the door, "We need to get Jack out of cryo!" said Garrus.

The intercom pinged again and the Warden sounded pissed, "Reinforce processing now! Shepard is loose! I repeat Shepard is loose!"

They cut through more Suns as they made their way to Jack, as they did so, Shepard learned more about his new teammates, Lieutenant Swash apparently was armed with stealth cloaking tech, coupled with his deadly marksmanship skills, he was no doubt qualified to be one of the deadliest snipers in the galaxy, the War Pigs were no pushovers neither, their power armor could actually tank mass accelerated rounds and it has saved their skins often when the kinetic barriers were overloaded. Shepard cringed in disgust when he noticed a Blue Sun Legionnaire get literally sawed in half by Mike, one of the War Pigs brought along.

"Enemy frag!"

Warned another War Pig, he jumped out of cover, a feat Shepard thought impossible due to the clunkiness and cubersome size of their power armor, Mike pulled both Shepard and Garrus out of the way, seconds before the explosion destroyed a large chunk of their previous cover."Thanks!" yelled the Turian as he began moving into a new cover."2 hostiles left, trooper and Heavy!" reported Garrus, wanting some payback, Shepard crowned the Heavy, just miliseconds before she could fire up her biotics, the trooper, morale broken threw his gun aside, and yelled from his cover, "I surrender! Don't shoot me please!" John motioned to Falks and one of his Pigs to secure the guard, once they did so, Shepard began questioning,

"Tell me the truth and I promise you won't be harmed, where's Jack's cell?"

The guard-now-turned-prisoner pointed out, getting to her would be difficult, as she's special case, Warden Kuril had assigned 3 YMIR mechs to guard against her, however, he managed to mention a security console before Garrus smacked him unconscious. Falks was meanwhile prepping his fireteam to move on the Commander's orders, "How much left?" he nodded over to Corporal Samuel, who used an armored index finger to skim through his magazines strapped to the sides of his suit.

"3, of em' full. I'd say we're holding good here but circumstances can change, we should have brought more mags just in case, then again, boss, it was supposed to be a simple pickup,"

Falks nodded before slipping his visor back, the thrum of his power pack ringing in his ears, the Commander rapped on his shoulder plate, getting his attention.

"We're moving now, by the way, anything I should know off?" hinting that he had been listening on their conversation.

"Yeah, we're runnin' low on ammo, this was supposed to be short and simple, not a goddamn turkey shoot, but don't ya worry about us, our Impalers pack a shit-ton of spikes so it should last throughout this entire mission."

Shepard wondered what he meant by 'spikes', was it a term for their ammunition where they come from, or the real pointy spikes? _one more thing to ask once we get off this ship. Damn I'm too eager to jump the gun. _thought the Commander bitterly as he had not gotten to know more about his new allies, instead, he flung his team with them into combat, too eager to watch them in action. More Blue Suns hindered their path, but it was pointless trying to stop _**THE** _Commander Shepard from completing his mission, Swash, the Ghost showed his prowess by single handedly clearing the security room filled with at least 2 dozen hostiles, Shepard and his squad just stood at the entrance, flabbergasted and in awe at the Ghost's dance of death, he moved fluidly with grace no human not even the Commander himself could do, and he was armed with only a silenced C-7 stinger pistol and a 15 inch serrated combat blade, when he was done, not a single hostile was breathing, Shepard took a few seconds to recover before grabbing Swash by the scruff of his suit and sharply pulled the Ghost,

"That was the most reckless thing I have ever seen! You are part of MY squad, you follow MY orders and you do not get in fights without MY blessings, if you do that again, you can stay here and rot with the Blue Suns and the prisoners, you get me, Operative?"

Falks had a good mind to intervene, yelling at a Ghost was a one way ticket to heaven, or hell and Falks does not want to lose his walking paycheck,

"Uh, Commander, you might wanna"-

"Yes Commander, I understand." spoke the Ghost coldly, biting back his anger at the same time. Shepard turned to Falks, they locked eyes for a short while before the Commander tore his gaze and rallied Garrus and Miranda to take point, Lieutenant Swash reloaded his C-10 before re-joining Shepard.

"That went well, boss," spoke Corporal Imlay over the comms, the War Pig Sergeant shook his head and formed his fireteam up behind Shepard's squad, Shepard's actions were beginning to bite the entire team back in the ass, true they finally saw what she looks like, but now they were caught in a deadly crossfire between scared-out-of-their-wits Blue Suns and thousands of the galaxy's most dangerous criminals, Shepard knew about having to deal with the prisoners but this was just ridiculous! His team turned out deadly effecient in the art of killing however, anyone who turned their gun onto them were swiftly dealt with, and finally they even managed to kill the Warden himself, having their boss dead, the remainders of the Blue Suns decided to leave the station via dropships, now most of the resistance are the local population.

"EDI, status of Jack?" growled the Commander as hostile fire peppered at his cover, they've been running into nothing but waves of armed prisoners and it was beginning to piss Shepard off. The feminine voice of the Normandy's AI replied monotone as always,

"Her current location is the same as ever, the docking bay where the Normandy is which is 52 meters away from your position."

Once the last hostile was dead, the 6 man-team began quickening their pace, this Jack had led them on a wild goose chase throughout the Purgatory, "Eyes on Jack!" reported Mike, "You don't say, War Pig?" retorted Garrus, past the broken bodies of unfortunate guards, there was Jack, pacing back and forth growling and snarling at the Normandy, for reasons unknown. Before he could call her out, a lone Batarian Blue Suns trooper lined his shot on her, without a moment's notice Shepard crowned the Sun with his enhanced reflexes courtesy of Cerberus.

Kuril was right about Jack at least, she is truly hate and anger in physical form, she eyed his armor for a short while before snarling venomously, "Cerberus!" before spitting a few feet away from herself.

"I work with Cerberus, I don't work for them, I am Commander Jonathan Shepard, I-"

Jack shook her head hard, "I don't give a flying fuck about what your name is, you're Cerberus and that's all I need to know, now give me 3 good reasons why I shouldn't tear you apart right here, right now?"

Miranda tried using authority on her, but, all she got from Jack was, "Wrong answer, Bitch!" She came charging after Shepard, growling as she does so, causing him to stumble backwards, her body laced with biotics intending to cause grievous injuries to him, most likely to kill him, when the others tried to shoot her, Shepard got them to stand down, he looked up and saw Jack right in front of him her arms launching a powerful Biotic attack right in his face, something swiftly grabbed his arm and yanked him aside from harm's way.

"Swash!" he cried out, Garrus and Miranda could do nothing but stare helplessly as the Ghost was consumed in a fiery blue explosion that rocked the entire prison barge, and flung every soul present aside like rag dolls, Shepard was the first to recover and to his utter amazement, was Lieutenant Swash, encircled in some kind of shimmering aura, blue biotics engulfed the invisible shield, but the occupant was unharmed. Jack quickly broke off from her attack, "What the fuck!" the Ghost cocked his head to his side, before egging her on with an outstretched hand, giving in to her rage.

Jack did so and charged headlong with her fist glowing blue, Shepard wanted to break them away from each other but Falks had stopped him from doing so, only telling him to watch. And so he did.

It was like watching an old Kung Fu movie from the 21st Century, 2 highly skilled opponents duking it out with each other, though one was Biotic the other was Psionic. Jack swung her left fist and tried to hook the Ghost but her biotic charged fist found air and she felt herself being lifted in the air, to her horror she saw the Ghost simply waved his hand up in the air, her body following the direction of it like some puppet,

"What the ffuu-" was all she managed before the Ghost slammed her up and down, up and down, up and down before he tossed her a few feet away from him. Jack sat herself right before launching a series of Biotic shockwaves, the Ghost did the invisible shield thing again but it did not hold against a full frontal Biotic attack, especially from Jack, the Ghost this time was slammed against a wall, the sound of something broken echoed loudly.

The Biotic wasted no time in letting her opponent recover and tried giving him a double tap, as she got real close to the Ghost, he suddenly sprang up with a long nasty blade in his hands, like that would ever stop her, she allowed a small evil grin before launching a Warp right in his face but the Ghost did something totally unexpected, he formed a fist with his right hand and her Warp attack stopped altogether, it instead began gathering itself on top of his fist and was encased in a Psychic field, making it appear like a glowing blue orb, a deadly glowing blue or. Realising what was going to happen, Jack jumped out of the way before the Ghost returned her Biotic attack mixed with his own, the orb crashed against the wall behind Jack and caused a small explosion, overturning some benches and utterly wrecking a vending machine.

The Ghost stood over the insanely powerful woman and lifted his right hand, with Jack's body following suit against her will, though as she kicked, clawed to get free of whatever the Ghost was doing, until she was levitating a good one meter in the air, earning astonished gasps from Shepard and his original squadmates, Swash balled his right hand and began choking Jack a-la-Darth Vader style.

"Enough, Lieutenant that's enough!"

Yelled Shepard as he raised his M-8 Avenger at Swash, ready to maim him. the Ghost spared a glance at Shepard, that was before a biotic charged fist slammed home in his face, he crashed onto the floor, no bones broken luckily but that hit sure did a number on him, anyone else would have been dead but Swash had kept a psychic field around himself, similar to Protoss psionic shields only much much weaker, but definitely reliable especially at times like this. Jack coughed a few times and slowly stood up, trembling as she did so, the Ghost did the same minus the coughing. Never before had an opponent managed to threaten her like this, she was supposed to be baddass! But this opponent was different, he is definitely NOT biotic.

"What the fuck are you?" she snarled as she wiped blood off her lips, The Ghost charged, he tackled Jack and was rewarded with a biotic slam, Jack jumped on top of the Ghost, ready to deliver the killing blow but found the wind knocked out of her as the Ghost kicked her in the gut and pivoted her body over him thus buying time for himself some time to tackle her once more, both now locked in a fight for dominance, in the end, Swash came out victorious as he held the blade against her throat but found himself staring at her hand glowing blue ready to deliver another powerful Biotic attack.****A close encounter of the mexican standoff, between Biotic and Psionic**_._**

**_THWACK_! **

Jack crumpled to the floor unconscious, standing behind her was Garrus, with his trusty M-92 Mantis Sniper Rifle by his side. "And I thought that fight would never end," he helped the Ghost up before commenting on their fight, "That was the most epic fight scenes I've ever had the pleasure to witness, how did you do all those-" Garrus felt something heavy collapse onto him as the Ghost swayed gently and fell onto Garrus's arms, unconscious.

"Need some help here!" cried the Turian.

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><p><strong>AN: Hell yeah baby, I'm done! Whoo! Thanks guys for hanging in there and supporting me with your PMs, I had a writer's block trying to write the fight between a Biotic and a Psionic, eventually I decided to make them both equally matched, and had to actually delete and rewrite alot of stuff just to perfect the ending, I decided to change it due to the fact it was more awesome(er) than the original. Sorry Bioware, copyright's all yours and all, just let me have this small ending. :3**

**Shepard is Paragon. Just so you know.**


	12. Chapter 10: Explanations

**_2185 CE, 17:20 hours_**

**_Medical Ward, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Osun System, Mass Relay_**

**_2 months, 5 days after First Contact..._**

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><p>Even unconscious, Lieutenant Nijax Swash knew to an extent what was happening around him. His psionic abilities merely amplified what he was able to hear. Bits and pieces of yelling, his new Commander's arguing with somebody, bunch of War Pigs screaming. He felt his world go truly black when someone pumped his body 300cc of sedatives into his system...<p>

Commander Shepard gave one last glance at the two casualties lying on separate beds, bodies strapped down with belts and whatnot should they awake and turn violent. Doctor Chakwas placed her hand on Shepard's shoulder, "They will be alright, Commander, just give it some time. You should catch some shuteye as well, you look worse for wear."

Shepard could only afford a smile before leaving the Medical Ward. As he turned round the corner, he came face to face with Garrus. And a bunch of War Pigs, with Falks among them. "Commander," said the mercenary leader. "We need to talk."

_'Damn right we need to'_ thought Shepard.

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><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 17:25 hours<em>**

**_Crew Deck, Bunk 0-22, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Osun System, Mass Relay_**

**_2 months, 5 days after First Contact..._**

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><p>The door closed with a silent <em>ping! <em>Inside were a couple of Pigs, Shepard and Garrus. They sat in total silence, their eyes egging one another to break the silence and begin the conversation. They didn;t invite the Cerberus woman, they don't need to, she probably planted listening bugs and right now, she's probably listening in anyway.

"I'll just ask one question. What. The. Fuck, happened back there?"

Falks and Private Mike exchanged glances before Falks stood up and replied, all the while looking at the shorter man in the eye.

"He...is what you'd call a Ghost. They were originally the Confederacy's, now the Terran Dominion's greatest assassins, doing their dirty work. They have no say in what they do, they're puppets, brought up as child soldiers, killing since they could learn to masturbate. What you saw back there on Purgatory was one of the many reasons Ghosts are feared. They are psionics, or psychics as you might put it."

Shepard and Garrus shifted uneasily, not happy with what they heard, Psychics? puppets? Child soldiers? What kind of galaxy these people live in?

"Child soldiers? mindless drone puppets? What the...you know what, start off from the beginning, how you came to know all about them." said the Commander. Falks cringed, unhappy with what he was about to say.

"Back when War Pigs were a sub-black ops group, I was a Lieutenant back then, of course, I worked with a few Ghost operatives, mostly to recce the area before giving the Ghosts clearance to execute their assasinations. I know this one Ghost, Agent-KV2, or Cindy. Pretty girl, blue eyes, nice ass, big boobies, ya know and she was real quiet and didn't like talking about her private life but...after some missions with her I got her to give away some things about herself. Most of the time when a Ghost goes on missions they're given memory wipe, a contingency plan to make them ghosts useless if they're compromised. Surprisingly, the Confederacy easily writes them off as bad debts when in truth, it's way too expensive and time consuming to train Ghosts."

Garrus made his disgust towards how the governments treat their soldiers, "Next thing you're telling me your government actually legalise the use of criminals to fight."

Falks burst out laughing, "Oh, you funny fucking alien, of course we do! Hell, 92% of the Terran Dominion's Marines are brainwashed convicts, I am, Mikey here is too."

Garrus twitched his eyes and clicked his jaws, his hand slowly slipping for his pistol. Working with mercs, he can handle but he just can't stand criminals, especially after working for C-sec for many years and seeing all kinds of scumbags people thought never existed. Shepard bobbed his head slowly, even though he was disgusted, by alot of things Falk's governments had done, but with the state of conflict they were in it was in a twisted way, understandable, he rembered what Councilor Anderson once told him.

_"One of the first casualties of war are innocence and the civility."_

"I'll tell you about our military later Garrus once I'm done explaining shit to the Commander. Now, from what Cindy told me, Ghost recruits are usually brought in somewhere before her teens, Confederate white coats pumped her full of narcotics, other kinds of wierd drugs and some...enhancements much different than how the Alliance does to it's soldiers.

Most of their trainings are about developing their psychic powers, trust me, psychics are fucking rare and even then, the most powerful human Psionic still cannot compare to the Protoss.

But, they've been taught certain stuff, one of which is mind reading. It's not their fault if they read your mind, they're radars picking up whatever someone else projects from their mind. A Ghost is classified under psi index of 1-10. The higher the number, the more powerful a Ghost is, and judging from that shit Swash pulled on Purgatory, I'd say he's a real badass. Psi indexes of 7 and above are really rare.

A fully trained Ghost can easily mind control others, manipulating feelings, and other wierd shit. Course after the fall of the Confederacy, me and Cindy "left" the military and settled down, yes, she's my wife. I came back as a merc since its the best job I know off. I got no qualifications other than killing anyway."

Garrus tried to coerce more information about the Terran military from Falks, starting with using convicts.

"Hmm, we'd all start off as convicts,"

"Don't you guys use volunteers? How did the public respond to the use of armed convicts?" pressed Shepard.

"Well yeah, we do have volunteers but they're too few, a Marine's life expectancy is somewhere between a few weeks, 6 months at most, I've got a standing record of service for over 10 years in the Corps so i get to call bullshit on that claim. The public...hmm...I heard about some protests across the core worlds of the use of armed criminals but they got silenced within a few days, most likely a Ghost got sent in. True, volunteers would be better at what they do but brainwashed criminals are much more easier to control, the offer was too much to turn down, 2 years in the corps and you walk away free, whatever the charges you were sentenced upon, I got sent to Braxis, some planet nothin' but a ball of ice for bootcamp.

The brainwashing process is what we'd call resocialisation. Convicts get thrown and submerged in huge tanks filled with breathable water, from there they add memories and implants in your mind to stop you from being overly aggressive and you become a much more docile shadow of your past.

I went through resoc, wasn't pretty, I remember nailing some white coats in the face before they had to tranq my ass with 500cc of sedatives. There, now you people know how fucked up our governments are."

Garrus and Shepard exchanged glances, unsure of how to handle the information given to them, the other War Pigs looked like they were gonna laugh any second, a while later, the Commander and the marksman left the crew deck, back to their personal quarters, both of which convinced a good night rest would clear their heads.

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><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 18:22 hours<em>**

**_Science Lab, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Osun System, Mass Relay_**

**_2 months, 5 days after First Contact..._**

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><p>Mordin Solus tapped the holographic screen and it lit up, presenting an array of numeric figures and writings in Salarian. He was not working on the counter against Collector Seeker Swarms, but on a special project. He had been going on at it for almost a week, sometimes not catching any sleep, working and poking around his samples and he had finally worked out the proper conditions for them.<p>

His samples were vials of of Neo-steel melted down to liquid form and evenly spread out in different test tubes. The Neo-steel originally was but a small chip off a War Pig's suit, if Mordin could somehow manage to synthesize more of these metals, who knows what wonder they can bring to the galaxy!

Cheap, Versatile and most definitely durable. That was what the War Pigs told him about it and the Doctor sure was impressed it lived up to its name. Mordin was close to a breakthrough and that usually means 1-2 weeks.

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 09:55 hours<em>**

**_Medical Deck, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Osun System, Mass Relay_**

**_2 months, 6 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>Commander Johnathan Shepard met up with Doctor Chakwas outside the Medical Deck, she looked jittery of sort. It was rare to see a veteran combat doctor get scared all of a sudden which gave John a chill running down the back of his spine.<p>

"Doctor, you said you needed to see me?"

"Why, yes, yes I did. I got good news and bad news which do you want to hear?"

John cracked a joke to calm her down, and also himself, "You know I like my deserts first,"

"Both of your patients have recovered though not fully, they're stable, capable of basic movements without spraining or hurting anything."

"Right, now give me my veggies,"

Chakwas hesititated slightly, "Well, I think, I think it's best if you saw it for yourself,"

As the two of them entered Medical, the first thing they both heard was, "Fuck you asshole!" and the sound of something crashing to the floor, _Jack._

_'Oh god, not this again,' _groaned the Commander as he overtook Chakwas in a full sprint, well, as he expected, the Ghost with his helmet-facemask off was ducking behind an overturned hospital bed, pinned down while Jack, in all her Biotic fury was unrelentingly throwing objects at him.

"Hey, hey, what's going on?" called the Commander. Jack swung around before stabbing forth her index finger at the 32 year old ressurected Commander, "You! You're in charge of these Fuck-ups right?" John didn't take the insult well as he found himself clenching and unclenching his fists, yes, they were Cerberus but...once you got to know them, they're not all bad. Most signed on not for personal gains or Humanity triumphing over aliens and whatnot, no, they volunteered after taking years of beauracratic bullshit from the Systems Alliance.

"I'll pretend I never heard that, yes, I'm in charge of them, I work alongside them but I do not work **_FOR _**them. In case you didn't know, Human Colonies not listed under the Alliance have gone dark, empty, Not. A. Single. Trace. Left of the colonists. And No, Cerberus is not behind it, they've acquired my help in uncovering what the hell is going on."

Jack's rage and glowing biotics that had shrouded her entire body slowly dissipated, she began slowly, "Then..did...you find anything?"

"We tagged our bogeys, and you're not gonna believe it, Collectors were responsible for the attacks and abductions."

"Collectors huh? Hmm, soldierboy, you sure know how to pick a fight, I'm guessing you sprung me out of that hell-hole not just to hand my ass over to Cheerleader and her cronies huh?"

"Cheerleader? Who's - oh i geddit. Nope, see, I'm putting together a team, a team full of...badass_ery_, bad enough to take the fight to the Collectors, beyond the Omega 4 relay, and stop their operations."

"Wow," whispered the convict softly, "Shit just got real, huh?"

'Damn straight. Now, the people here are Cerberus crew, but, you are not to harm them. Any of them, do that and I'll have you shoved through the airlock with a bomb strapped on your ass. Just kidding about that last part."

"Hmph, fine, at least there's ass to be kicked I'm in, but...I want 2 things in return." Her expression became dark again.

"Name your price."

"One, you're gonna give me files, databanks, anything related to me, classified or not, I wanna find out what those freaks were actually doing to me."

"Huh, bad childhood? Alright, seems fair enough, EDI, send her the files as soon you can, oh, and uh, send me a copy as well."

The AI of the Normandy SR-2 appeared on a pedestal of a glowing blue ball. "Acknowledged Commnder Shepard, however, it would mean a breach of classified Cerberus-"

"EDI, I'm in charge of this entire op, this ship is owned by yours truly, if Illusive Man needs anything he wants to clarify with, just let me know."

"Understood, Commander, logging off."

Shepard stole a quick glance at Lieutenant Swash, the Ghost Operative had probably got bored of the conversation and dozed off, behind his makeshift cover. Jack assumed what had interacted with Shepard was an AI, but she paid no heed, as Shepard suddenly continued their conversation.

"Back to what you were saying, what's the last part of the deal, Jack?"

The convict looked back to the 32 year old. just 10 minutes talking to him and he's already agreed to give in to her wants, _'Hell, I like him already,'_

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 10:00 hours<em>**

**_Armoury, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Osun System, Mass Relay_**

**_2 months, 6 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>A band of War Pigs, Private Mike Bloomfield and PFCs, Imlay Jacintho and Wilkins Frost. Alongside them was former C-sec Officer, Garrus Vakarian and the Normandy's Master-At-Arms, Jacob Taylor. The War Pigs has agreed to show a small number of their weapons to the two, save for the heavy weapons. All 3 Pigs were clad in CMC-400, the latest issue power armor.<p>

Originally they wore CMC-300, however, during their service to James Raynor, they got new toys to play with all thanks to new funds recieved for each successful operation against the Dominion or the Swarm. Now, PFC imlay stood up, flipped his visor open, he has a cigarette hanging on the roof of his mouth which seems to stick to his mouth as the Pig began speaking.

"Now," He brings his Impalers to bear. "What I'm holding here is the C-14 Impaler Gauss Rifle, standard infantry weapon, you probably guess how Gauss tech works right? Magnetic coils and shit?" Garrus shook his head while Taylor nodded.

"Good, so, how much do you know about our weapons?" piped PFC wilkins Frost, the War Pig's own Master-At-Arms. Taylor scratched his chin as he answered, while Garrus just eyes the power armor they wore.

"I know they run on gas cartridges, they got no need for Element-Zero, and from what the ground team that stormed Purgatory, those Impalers rip through Kinetic barriers like it wasn't there, alarming high rate of fire but inaccurate at ranges above 100 meters."

Imlay smirked, _'Man knows this gun well. But not well enough._' "Correct, but, you're forgetting the other features," He then held a long piece of steel spike, which the both Garrus and Taylor cringed, if those were what they think it was, then it was no wonder those Blue Suns and armed prisoners died extremely brutal deaths. Their suspicions were confirmed by PFC Imlay.

"This is the standard munitions for the Impaler, 8 millimeter steel tipped spikes. We, however, use custom rounds; hollow points, damn good against organics cuz' it leaves a big ass exit wound for any of us to jump through. The Impaler is not one to mess with, it's got a built in laser targetting system, low light and high light, for tactical and also for calldown strikes. And lastly, since this is a new model, it's been outfitted with something badass to fight off Zerglings in CQB."

He squeezed on a button underneath the rifle and immediately the spring loaded bayonet popped out. Both men cringed visibly for it was one nasty blade. Standing proud at 12 inches, and serrated, this monster of a rifle can put the hurt both at mid range and short range.

Taylor barely concealed his excitement, it was almost like playing with a mini 30 millimeter turret, attached with a bayonet. Garrus too was impressed, however he was more interested in their marksman rifles, like the one Lieutenant Swash wielded, a hybrid between sniper and grenade launcher.

The C-10 Canister Rifle. Garrus wondered if the War Pigs had more of those rifles. All of a sudden, Mike tossed his Impaler to Vakarian, "Heads up,"

On instinct, the Turian caught the oversized rifle however, he felt his arms snap as his bones broke, obviously caught off guard by the weight,

"Argh, Spirits!" he cried. The War Pigs were laughing their asses off, Jacob hefted the rifle out of Garrus' hands and he too found himself struggling to carry it, however, he managed to sight down the gun properly, it wasn't so bad, they just needed more muscle power to be carried.

The recoil was unlike anything he's ever seen for an assault rifle, he might as well be firing off a Heavy Machine Gun as the first few rounds knocked the Cerberus Operative off his ass, but he managed to hit all the targets as compensation. Taylor watched with envy as one of the War Pigs hefted his own C-14 with just one hand, the superhuman strength coming from his powered suit, and let rip full auto on the target, ripping it apart to unrecognizable pile of metallic scrap.

After a few demos of the Impaler, the Pigs moved on to Garrus' forte, Sniping. They began with the Designated Marksman Rifle, known as the AGR-14, an older model of the AGR-28 yet still widely used. It's firing rate was similar to the M-8 Avenger, yet had the accuracy of a Mattock, and far more stopping power.

Garrus was dissappointed upon learning the C-10 was only used by Ghost Operatives, so he made do with their own Sniper Rifle : The BOSUN F-92, fires a .50 cal round yet had more stopping power than a C-14 spike. The rifle itself has a skeletal stock, built-in range finder, a telescopic sight and an extremely long barrel. This makes it an effective weapon, as the longer a bullet spends time in a barrel, the more likely it is to hit the target.

The Pigs could give more demos if only Commander Shepard had personally not sought them out and round them up for another meeting. Which means another badass motherfucker to recruit.

* * *

><p><strong>Hmm, I'll stop here now, and terribly sorry for not updating in a really long while. School kept me busy, and so did other factors including family, friends and my gaming habits. Haizz, I feel this chapter could be done so much more...But, I got bigger plans for this fic. Anyways, enjoy it and plz Review it. Thx.<strong>


	13. Preview Chapter!

**Okay Guys, I've decided to release a preview. It will be done in about a week. Roughly 3000 words. For now, enjoy it and tell watcha' think! ^^**

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 11:20 hours<em>**

**_Medical Ward, Normandy SR-2_**

**_Osun System, Mass Relay_**

**_2 months, 6 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>Shepard wasted no time in beginning the meeting, as soon as he stepped into the room, he motioned EDI to dim the lights and begin feeding their new recruit's vitae. They learnt more of the planet they'll be entering, background info, any hazards that may occur. Questions were flung back and forth in relations to the mission.<p>

A Krogan, Warlord Okeer to be exact apparently, he's no ordinary Krogan since Cerberus wants to recruit him, this means the team was gonna have to be extra careful, a loose 7 foot tall monstrosity rampaging the Normandy would not end well for Commander Shepard. They would be be dropping in hard through the atmos via dropship, land as close as possible and get to Okeer. The plan sounded solid enough.

A War Pigs fireteam led by Second Sergeant Sevchenko Gallardi would be their support team, their C-14s were considered Heavy Machine Guns. Close enough.

Franklin was gonna sit this one out, 'Let the others have a go,' says he. Miranda and Nijax Swash, who voiced his wants to go on another operation once again, Shepard approved and both would be deployed with the Commander. "Commander, what's our ROE?" asked the Cerberus affliated woman as she slapped a thermal clip into her Tempest SMG.

"We're not here to cause trouble, we're here for a simple extracting mission, pack light but just be prepared for a fight and only return fire if fired upon. Right, arm up, and meet me in the Hangar for dustoff in 10!"

The team said their acknowledgements and headed off. Jack had no mood to fight for she was still engaged in reading through her files..

The Ghost Operative was in the Armoury, bagging some grenades when Shepard came from behind him and put a comforting hand on his shoulder, immediately the Ghost whirled around, alarmed, a mask of rage on his face. Yet the Commander was unfazed at all,

"Hey, I'm just here to talk before we're off. I know of your origins, those things done to you by your government, it's harsh, unethical and something no child should go through. I don't see you as a weapon, you're a normal person just like me, the crew, and those guns-for-hire, and I need you to follow my orders. Look, what I'm saying is, I need a teammate who can feedback to this team well, that lone wolf stuff has to go. You get me?"

The Ghost looked down for a short duration before looking back in the Commander's eyes, and Shepard swore he saw Swash's irises dilute into a shade of green before switching back to blue. "Understood, Commander." he sneered venomously before brushing rudely past him.

John could only sigh and shake his head.

As Commander Shepard grabbed his M-8 Avenger from his locker, he pinged Joker over the comms to pilot the Normandy through the relay to the Korlus system. Not a minute later, the intercom spat and scratched.

"All hands, this is your Captain speaking, FTL jump in 2 minutes. Once again, thank you for flying with Air-Cerberus."

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 17:27 hours<em>**

**_Normandy SR-2_**

**_Korlus System, Mass Relay_**

**_2 months, 7 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>Sevchenko did a last minute check on his equipment, as did the other team members.<p>

As their ship dropped out of the Mass Relay, The other Pigs scrambled over to the port and starboard window panes to catch a glimpse of their designated planet. Korlus was a ball of dust, and radiation. most of the life forms that came before had shrivelled up and died during the Krogan Rebellions.

Sevchenko immediately barked an order.

"War Pigs, quit fucking around, head down to the hangar bays and RV with Commander Shepard, Imlay you got AT? good, Samuels how's the BOSUN? Good! Diamond, Impaler on Rock-And-Roll? Outstanding. Now get moving Pigs!"

Sevchenko clammed the visor down and the HUD came to life, he brought up the squad's loadout just in case some asshole brought more or less than they were supposed to. No need to repeat what happened aboard Purgatory, where the Pigs were bone dry on ammo.

* * *

><p><em>2nd SGT- Sevchenko Gallardi = Mario<br>- x 2 MkII V-21 Flashbang  
>- x 2 MkIII F-8 Smoke Grenade<br>- x 3 MkIV HE Fragmentation Grenade  
>- x 6 Cordex Model Magazine<br>- X 1 AGR-14 Assault Rifle  
><strong>-Cat-3 Marines Light On Their Feet-<strong>_

_CPL- Imlay Jacintho = Snowball  
><em>_- x 2 MkII V-21 Flashbang  
>- x 2 MkIII F-8 Smoke Grenade<br>- x 3 MkIV HE Fragmentation Grenade  
>- x 6 R-22 Model Magazine<br>- x 1 C-14 Impaler Gauss Rifle  
>- x 2 shoulder-mounted 110mm Heat-Seeking Rocket Launcher<strong><br>-Cat-3 Marines Light On Their Feet-**_

_CPL- Samuel L. Ackerson= Bullet  
>- x 2 MkII V-21 Flashbang<br>- x 2 MkIII F-8 Smoke Grenade  
>- x 3 MkIV HE Fragmentation Grenade<br>- x 7 BRF-3 Model Magazine  
>- x 1 BOSUN F-92 Long Rifle<br>**- Cat-3 Marines Light On Their Feet**_

_PFC - Peter D. Polanski = Diamond  
>- x 2 MkII V-21 Flashbang<br>- x 2 MkIII F-8 Smoke Grenade  
>- x 3 MkIV HE Fragmentation Grenade<br>- x 6 R-22 Model Magazine  
>- x 1 C-14 Impaler Gauss Rifle<br>**- Cat-3 Marines Light On Their Feet**_

* * *

><p>Well, everything checks out fine, so Sev headed to the hangar, passing through Cerberus crewmen who had to hug the wall just so they won't get hit brutally shoved by the enormous power armor he wore. Commander Shepard and his team was already there by the Dropship when Sev and his boys arrived, they boarded the dropship and had a last minute briefing as the pilot initaited flight diagnostics before he was clear to take off.<p>

"Alright Team, Eyes up!" barked their Commander/Employer.

All eyes snapped to him, except Samuels who lit a cigarette, snapped his visor down so he wouldn't get caught smoking, all done in 3 seconds.

Garrus banged his right hand onto Samuel's Shoulder plate. "Did you just-"

However he could not finish as a Holographic Display lit up, covering a full section of the dropship's bulkhead.

Shepard's Omni-Tool sprang to life as he began pointing out information crucial to the objective.

(Okeer. Who he is. What he does. Where will he be. Blue Suns. ROE. Investigations are second priority. Prisoners to be kept at minmal amount. Last minute Ammo check. Status Green. Both Teams dropping same location hard on dirt in 5 minutes.)

"L-Z looks clear, I'm bringing her down!"

Chimed the pilot, not a moment later, the entire dropship jerked suddenly which was a sign to the Commander, 'It's Go Time!'

* * *

><p><strong><em>2185 CE, 17:57 hours<em>**

**_Korlus, Imir_****_ System, _**

**_2 months, 7 days after First Contact..._**

* * *

><p>As Shepard's team advanced further into the unknown, Sev's team hang back to cover the rear, it was a damn easy job, you just need good eyesight and a cigarette and a big ass gun. Samuels kept complaining in SQUADCOM that his targeting systems and thermal-imaging feature in his HUD was going haywire, and it wasn't just him in fact the other War Pigs had the same problem.<p>

There's something about this planet that does not agree with other-worldly equipment. Sev cursed inwardly and prayed this mission would be over.

In the mean time, he might as well give Shepard a heads up.

"Commander, be advised, our equipment is being fucked by this planet, something here does not agree with our kit. Our comms are good, but targetting systems and HUD are going haywire. Expect us to lack in combat effectiveness." muttered Sev.

"Acknowledged, Bravo-2. Do what you can, just have our asses covered." replied the Commander without so much as stealing a glance behind.

"Ten-Four."

A dropship suddenly came into view, no doubt carrying a squad of Blue Suns, "Cover!" cried Miranda and everyone melted into whatever shelter they could find. The dropship sped past, nothing out of the ordinary coming into view, the pilot steered the bird towards its designated drop-off point.

"Dammit that was close, Swash, you're on recon! Bravo Team you're now on point, Miranda, nice job spotting that fast mover." commended Shepard with a sigh of relief while the Pigs groaned that they were now leading the team.

After almost an hour of trekking, the team worn out by then, chanced upon some abandoned structures and what appears to be a small Blue Suns outpost manned by 4 troopers. One appears to be injured and tending to himself at a further distance than the others while the remaining 3 were on guard. There was a small Machine Gun nest as well which makes matters worse.

Shepard wanted to send the War Pigs onto the MG nest but was met with disagreement, "Hell no, our suits can tank your Mass-Accelerated shit but not against a fucking canon!" whined Peter. So, now Shepard had to wait for Swash to clear them out. When he got in position, the Ghost did not snipe, instead he used psionics and turned them against each other, much to Shepard and Miranda's horror. The Pigs barely flinched for they had seen the Ghost's handiwork dozens of time.

The first Guard went rigid while the other 2 continued their business, without warning he opened fire on the two and attempted to cut them down, the first one was perforated, his kinetic barrier failing to hold against the Revenant LMG he was holding.

Tthe second one ducked to cover and tried to talk him out of it, but the minute he popped his head out, a fist sized object smacked the Suns trooper on the head. Before the poor bastard even realised what it was, his world turned white as the Frag grenade detonated.

The mind-controlled Blue Suns trooper then slid his pistol into his mouth and pulled the trigger, splattering warm crimson blood all over the damn walls and adding to the macabre that just unfolded before everyone's eyes.

"Holy shit..." muttered Shepard, trying hard to keep his cool.

_'He turned them against one another...That's impressive and freaky, Illusive Man is definitely gonna be interested in him, I won't be surprised if he's begun experimenting with Biotics to unlock psychic abilities'_ Thought Miranda wide-eyed at the carnage and the prowess of the Psychic assasin.


End file.
